I LOVE NYC!

NYC from the Empire State Building

Cool American Flag display at Ellis Island

Alison, me, and Michael on the ferry to Ellis Island on Sunday

I saw Mary Poppins for the second time, first time on Broadway, on Saturday

(Alex-made me think of you, I took my picture with this in a museum on my mission)

Alison and I on Friday night, near Radio City

Alison, Michael, and Melissa in SoHo on Saturday

Me, Alison, and Megan at Rockefeller Center on Friday

Alison and I on Friday, after going to the Manhattan Temple

**Disclaimer: This is the only picture with my hair done, I did it Friday morning; it was humid and rained the whole weekend, so I did not waste time the rest of the weekend on my hair. Also, I did change clothes, I promise, but I did end up needing this green jacket most of the time.
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This post is overdue, like most of mine are, especially since it has been over a week since I left for New York City. So I had a good b-day and in order to extend the celebration a bit, as well as to celebrate my roommate, Melissa's b-day, we went with a few friends to NYC. It was an absolute blast! I have been twice before, but still absolutely love that city! Although, I will admit that I love living in Boston way more (it is more me) but it is nice being close to NYC...I suppose I would really like living there, but not for right now...my friend, Alison and I said maybe if we are still single and 35, we can head that way. We had invited around 12 friends, but people are lame and always bail...so it was 5 of us. Alison and I left with her friend, Megan (who had flown into Boston the night before from Las Vegas) on Friday morning. We took the subway, aka the T, into the city, and then got on our bus-a 4+ hour ride to NYC. We slept, I did some reading for a class, and we watched a funny, cheesy movie, Underdog, that was being shown. We spent Friday walking around Times Square, shopping along 5th Avenue (mostly looking), walking through Central Park, Alison and I did initiatories at the Manhattan Temple (my first time in that temple), we met up with Alison and Megan's friend, Caleb, and walked around Times Square some more, past Rockefeller Center (the Christmas tree was getting set up), past Radio City Music Hall, etc. We had some great dinner and some super yummy New York cheesecake! I met up with my roommate and went with her to get food at Carnegie Deli, I was still full. Then we headed to the Upper West End in a taxi to the apartment where we were crashing, a friend of a friend's place. Saturday morning I went for a run in Central Park-awesome! It was raining, but refreshing, and I love parks like that-very Hyde Park/London park-like. After Melissa and I grabbed some fresh fruit and yummy bread, we headed in to Times Square. We met up with Alison, and our other friend, Michael, and waited for half price Broadway tickets in the pouring rain! We were soaked! We explored Canal Street, and wandered through SoHo, and then came back for Mary Poppins, which I had already seen in London, but it was great, lots of fun, wonderful music...we all enjoyed it. We walked around some more, went up to the top of the Empire State Building when it was dark, had dinner at a fun diner, shopped some more, and then all headed our separate ways after 2 exhausting days. I managed to get Melissa and I turned around several times going the wrong way on our way back to our place...we were on the wrong side of the park, I usually have a better sense of direction, but it was dark, rainy, and I was tired. Sunday we got up, grabbed some yummy pastries for breakfast, and headed to church, we went to sacrament meeting in a family ward-it was the primary program. It was wonderful-I loved it! You really do miss those primary programs when you are in a single's ward for so long. Then we went to south ferry and went to Ellis Island, which I have never done, and loved. It was so interesting. We came back for dinner and headed to the bus for a very long ride home. I love NYC! There is so much to see and do! I was exhausted after 3 days straight of walking, but I have survived this past week more or less. I will post in a couple of days about this weekend, it will be fun, too!

I'll be home for the holidays!

...my Mom posts specifically for me, so this post is just for her...I am so excited to see you in like 38 days, I think it is...I am making a paper chain link to count down the days, too...here are pictures of it. (For those of you that do not know, I will be in Tokyo for 3 weeks for the holidays, and then I will be in Houston for 1 week. I love Boston University, giving me a month of vacation-a genius idea!!! )

Happy 25th B-Day to Me!

The flowers from my mom-thank you so much, I will be sure to enjoy them!

Rachel and I at dinner

So today I turned 25, and I feel great, so hopefully it will be another good year. 23 was weird, it's a prime number, an ugly number if you ask me, and it was a weird year...I have loved being 24, and I feel even better about 25. The day has been wonderful! I have received so many emails, phonecalls, texts, and notes wishing me a happy b-day from family, friends, and people here and all over. Thanks to everyone for remembering me! Special thanks to all my nieces and to my nephew for my birthday song renditions-they were the best part of my day. So all in all, I got sung to about...6 times, not bad. My mom so kindly posted on her blog just for me. Oh, also, Mom-I did get the flowers! They are beautiful. So my day was filled with nice things, but was all in all a normal Monday. I went for a run at 6:30 am, it was cool outside, and just perfect. I went to the school where I help teach PE for 3 hours this morning, then I went to work, then I had a class. After commuting home (by the way, I do my commuting on my bike...I am not dead yet and it's much cheaper!), I went out to dinner with my friends, Alison, Rachel, and Amanda. I have spoken with more family, and am enjoying my evening carefree. Tomorrow is Veterans Day, and since east coasters are patriotic or something, no school and no work for me. Yay!

Cupcake Decorating/Dessert Night!

Last night my good friend, Alison, threw a birthday party at my house for my roommate, Melissa, and I. My birthday was today, and Melissa has hers on Friday. We had lots of friends over for desserts and cupcake decorating. It was a good time, with good company.

Make a wish...I can't tell you what mine is or it won't come true, and I

really need it to come true!!! and soon!!!

My friend, Alison, made a super yummy b-day cake for us.

Here is my living room, filled with fun friends that live here in blessed Boston with me!

My good friends, Andrew (left) and Marissa (right), and I

Fun girls-Victoria, Kristie, Marissa, Cassie, and Melissa...

Cupcake decorating is one of my favorite things to do!

It was a fun night, with fun people coming and going throughout the evening. We had lots of yummy desserts, and boy, do I love sweets! So I indulged, and now I am on with my self-discipline for the rest of the week, and plenty of running! Alison also had everyone write birthday wishes for us on pieces of paper, and we had to read our wishes outloud. Some were inspiring, some were thoughtful, and some were umm...awkward. It was a great night. Happy early b-day to me!

One more state visited...

...which leaves me 22 or 23 more to visit...I forget, we counted a few weeks ago. Anyway, I made a weekend trip to Maine with my friends, Alison and Rachel, this past weekend. We left Saturday morning and came back Sunday evening, just in time for the CES Fireside. Rachel is from Maine, and has a best friend, also from Maine, who is living in Salt Lake City and who just got married. We went to Maine so that Rachel could go to the wedding reception on Saturday night. It was a beautiful drive, there are still pretty autumn leaves left, sooner than later though they will be gone, and we will be left with bare, wintery trees. We saw the world's largest globe, we went to the only actual L.L.Bean store (most of you just get catalogs) where I took my picture with the giant boot, only to find out right after that I wasn't supposed to be on it, oops! We did shopping in a cute area called Freeport, I only got winter gloves, but Alison got some great deals (plus she has money from her real job). We shared a whoopie pie, and headed back to Rachel's house. At the wedding reception, Alison and I planned our upcoming weekend trip to NYC! We are so excited for that! We are going for my belated birthday celebration with some other friends. Anyway, Sunday we went to church in Rachel's old family ward, had lunch with her parents, and had a great chat with her mom and dad about dating/boys/marriage-the usual talk of LDS single girls! We saw an awesome lighthouse on our way home, (I have always put Maine and lighthouses together) but sadly my camera battery died before that, so I will have to get some lighthouse pics from Alison to put up later. It was a great weekend in Maine! It has also meant that I have had an insanely busy week getting all my studying and work done for my classes this week....I work hard and play hard! It's a great life motto! Happy November! Time is flying!

Happy Belated Halloween!

I know this is a bit overdue, but I have a good excuse-I am so darn busy! My life never slows down, and at this point it will not until I am done with the semester...I do love school though, and I like all the anxiety and business of semesters. I chose this, right?! Well, after a long week, and a class cancelled on Thursday night...I got to start my Halloween festivities early. Some friends were hosting a Halloween party at their house on Thursday night, and I had made costume plans with my friends, Alison, Rachel, and Amanda. They are all roommates...I was friends first with Alison, then she moved houses, then she got a new roommate named Rachel, who quickly became a good friend, and then 2 weeks ago, another roommate named Amanda moved in...I am the token roommate...Anyway, we did a plan of salvation spin on things...Amanda was the sun (celestial kingdom), Alison was the moon (terrestrial kingdom), and Rachel was the stars (telestial kingdom)...which leaves me to be...OUTER DARKNESS! That's right! And for those of you that know me well...you know that I like any excuse to be scary or goth-like on Halloween, it all started back my senior year in high school...anyway, I was scary. We had fun at the party, and here are some of the pictures...enjoy, don't scream or be too scared, eh?! Hopefully, it is enough to want to keep you out of outer darkness for real. Hope you had happy halloweens, too!

PS-the first one is at the end of the night, I was done with my scary, teased hair...the second one is me and my friend, Shelby, who I knew in Salt Lake, she was in town visiting a friend for the weekend-that was a fun, random surprise!

I missed out...

...So as many of you know, High School Musical 3 came out a couple of weekends ago. I heard how wonderful it was from my sister and sister-in-law and all of my nieces, but unfortunately since I don't live in Texas or in London, I didn't have someone to take with me as an excuse. Yes, I will be honest, I like the movies...maybe it's cause Troy is oh, so darling, or maybe it is because I have loved the name Gabriella since I was 11 or 12 years old, and want to name my daughter that...or maybe it is because I do like all things Disney and cheesy. Anyway, maybe I will get to see it over the holidays or something, by then, all my nieces will have all the songs from the soundtrack memorized! Anyway, the night it came out I was out and about Boston with some friends, we had a fun get to gether at this guy's family-owned restaturant, and while we were out I saw a billboard advertising it. I just wanted you all to know how sad I was that I couldn't see it. To all my nieces: I am looking forward to High School Musical sing-a-longs and dance-a-longs over the holidays! I love you girls: Caitlyn, Aimee, Lainey, Havana, and Maddie (I love David and Izzie, too, but they aren't quite at the age to be HSM fanatics yet)!