Wow...

So it's been forever since I last posted here.  School has been CRAZY, and the semester is only two weeks old!!  This semester consists of chemistry, chemistry, oh and some more chemistry!  Throw in there a little bit of history and communications, and there's no extra time for me to even breathe!!  I think I've figured it out tho - as long as I don't think about anything further than tomorrow, I'll be fine.  The minute I start thinking about all the things I have to do within the next week, I totally get overwhelmed.  Note to self: take things one day at a time.  Despite the busy-ness of school and work, life has been good!  I try to balance out my academics with a little time with friends and the occasional visit home to Layton.  It's working out great so far! :) 

To make up for my lack of blogging during the past month, here are some highlights: 

1. One day during the first week of January (I can't remember the exact date...) I got so...incredibly...bored...that I ended up going outside to shovel snow and stomp paths through the snow to our front door to entertain myself.  We now have the finest snow paths in all of Salt Lake City.

2. Last week, on January 15th, I went to the LDS Fraternity/Sorority "Rush" Carnival - not to join a sorority (are you kidding?? I don't have time for that) but just because my friends were there and told me to come.  I had a great time!  There were all kinds of fun activities and food and games.  One of the games there can be compared to beer pong, but instead of cups with beer, there were cups of water.  What's so great about cups of water, you ask?  Well - in some of the cups, there were real, live goldfish!!!!  So when you tossed the ping pong ball over to the cups and it landed in one of the cups with a goldfish in it, you had to drink the water AND the goldfish!!!  I have such a good aim, that I got the happy privilege of drinking a goldfish.  You know that scene on Finding Nemo, where Marlin and Dori get stuck in that pelican's throat?  I know exactly how that pelican felt.  Except I didn't spit my fish back out...I actually swallowed him. 

3. I have successfully pushed 4 stuck cars out from the back of our ice and snow filled driveway!!  For 3 of the cars, I had help from one or two other people, but this last incident - one that involved a TRUCK - I did on my own.  My roommate Amanda came into my room one Saturday morning at 6:30 and asked if I could come help push her out, because she was spinning on the ice.  So I got up to go help her.  First I tried pushing while she stepped on the gas...didn't work.  Then we switched, with her pushing and me on the gas.  Again...nothing.   So then I decide to bring out the secret weapon: salt.  We spread that all over the driveway and around the wheels, and then we decided to push one more time.  So Amanda climbed in the truck, I took my position in the back, and singlehandedly, I pushed that truck out of the driveway.  I guess some (or most....) credit needs to go to the salt, but still.  By MYSELF people.  Little me pushing a truck.  That's pretty impressive. :) haha

4. I've been kicked out of the America First Metro branch.  Okay, not really - but I like to say it like that. :) So here's what's happened: The branch that I work at (the Metro branch) is considered the training branch for our district.  It just so happens that within the past month, AFCU has hired 6 new tellers who all need to be trained.  At the same time.  At our branch, we have at least 16 tellers that rotate shifts to share 11 teller stations.  16+6=...too many tellers, not enough teller stations.  So they've sent me away for awhile. :) This past week I started going down to the Millcreek branch.  At first I wasn't so excited about that, but it's actually been really fun!! It's a nice breath of fresh air away from Metro.  I also like that the branch is a lot less ghetto than the Metro branch - everything is new and improved! There are no cramped stations or out of date computer monitors - even the members are new and improved!!  There are hardly any smelly members!!  That's kind of mean, but its true!!  I really like it at Millcreek, I don't know if I'll WANT to go back to Metro!!  I'll be there for 3 or 4 weeks, so I'll enjoy it while I can! 

Well there you go - my life in a very small nutshell :)

p.s. Here's just a friendly reminder: My birthday is 13 days from now, encounting...

The Week of Fridays!

This week was fabulous - every night this week felt like it was Friday night! It was GREAT!! :D On Monday for FHE, my student ward went down to see the lights at temple square! It had snowed earlier that day, which made the lights even more pretty!! After the lights, I got to play basketball at the institute for awhile, and then we went to the Pie for dinner! It was my first time there, and it was a lot of fun! The atmosphere there is so fun...the restaurant is in this basement with tons of writing and graffiti looking stuff on the walls, with music and tv playing, and the PIZZA! Oh it was delicious! I loved it! So that was the first "Friday" night of the week! On Tuesday, I got to go home to Layton because my family had tickets to a Jon Schmidt concert up in Ogden!! Jon Schmidt is so funny! I wish I could play the piano like him! His piano Christmas songs totally set the Christmas mood for me! Then on Wednesday I got a surprise phone call from my cousin Danny, who just got home from his mission to Colombia!! He said he was coming down to Salt Lake to hang out with Rachel and Clint (my other cousins!) and he wondered if I wanted to hang out too! So after my Anatomy Lab Practicum (which went very well! I had to identify 70 different structures on different body parts in the cadaver lab...it was thrilling) Danny came over, and then we headed over to Clint and Rachel's apartment for a night of games and Ratatouille! I had a blast! I love my cousins!! :D Thursday after work, I was back over to Rachel's apartment for another night of movies and just hanging out! Rachel works with me at America First now, so we have a lot of fun! So finally we're to the REAL Friday night - last night - which was probably the best Friday night of this week! I went to an "Ugly Sweater" party for like 15 minutes - just enough time to have some hot chocolate and burn my tongue while I was at it - came back home and played Settlers of Catan (my new favorite game!!), went to the Pie again and then stayed up til 4 in the morning watching Pursuit of Happyness!! So basically, this week was great. Loved it. :D

Best Weekend EVER!!!

Coldplay's Stage!! The lasers were so cool!!

COLDPLAY!!!

At the Coldplay Concert!!!

Touring Temple Square!!



This past weekend was amazing!! My sister Shannon came down to Salt Lake and we had all kinds of adventures!!! We toured Temple Square and the Church History Museum first, then after that we went to the Salt Palace for my work's Bonus Night, then it was off to the Energey Solutions Arena for Coldplay!! The concert was awesome!!! Coldplay played all their fabulous new songs as well as some of their old ones!! I LOVE Coldplay!!!




Since Saturday was also the big U of U vs. BYU football game, they had the game playing on big screens for us to watch at the Salt Palace during Bonus night!!! I must say I thorougly enjoyed watching the Cougars lose!!! GO UTES!!!!




I absolutely love Salt Lake!! There are always so many activities going on and so many fun places to visit that are only like 5 minutes away!!! The University of Utah was definitely the right choice of school for me!! Shannon really wants to come here too!! Hopefully that works out! We would have so much fun living together. We had a blast together this weekend, I can only imagine what college life would be like with her!! :D

What the Weather???

Is anyone else out there confused by the weather?? A few weeks ago, I woke up to a blizzard and freezing temperatures. Now, with December 10 short days away, I'm shedding my jacket and thinking about going and putting on some shorts!!! What is the deal?? Its about time we had some snow if you ask me. How on earth am I supposed to go skiing with the sun blazing down on us like this? That's Utah for ya I guess...

Blackout Game!!!

Last night was the Utah-TCU game!! It was probably one of the best games I've ever been to! Well, at least the 4th quarter was good...that's when all the exciting stuff happened!! Like when TCU missed 2 field goals, and when we scored a touchdown with 48 seconds left to win the game!! AMAZING!!! :D Now Utah is first in the Mountain West Conference, AND we're bowl eligible!!! There's nothing like a Utah game, they're always so fun!! Hopefully we'll win the next two games (one of them being against the team down south) and have another perfect season!! "Fill your lungs and sing it out and shout it to the sky, we'll fight for dear old crimson for a Utah man am I!" GO UTES!!!! :D

The team in their awesome blackout jerseys!!

My roommate Amanda and me!!!

The final score!!! GO UTES!!!

Thrilled

This is me being thrilled about the snow...

Blizzard!!

Basically it's been snowing all day...I wouldn't have been too upset by that, except for the fact that the heater in my house was NOT on when I woke up! It hadn't turned on all night either. Apparently, the girls downstairs have been regulating the heat in the basement by turning the furnace (which happens to heat the entire house) on and off whenever they feel like it. Unforunately, they forgot to turn it back ON when we really needed it! So I woke up this morning in a 59 degree house. Not the greatest way to start off the day. But now the heat is on, the sun is coming out, and things are looking up in the life of Nikole :). This is the view from the Trax station looking down my street.