Last Week at 24

So yesterday began my last week as a 24 year old. On saturday I will be a quarter century old or 25. That's so crasy to think about, that I have been alive for 25 years. At times I feel as though I have accomplished nothing but then I stop and actually look back and realize that I have done alot in my 25 years. I have earned an associates degree in generals, I have graduated from massage school and was nationally certified. I have almost earned my bachelors degree in Horticulture, only three more semesters. I have done some traveling, not alot but some. I have lived on my own and survived!!! I have earned lots of different on the job experiencces and training in many different fields. I have loved and lost, broken hearts and had mine broken. I have gone from a depressed teenager to a young woman who has learned how to maintain a happy out look on life  and to manage any depression tendencies I have. I have read, and collected over 500 books. I have learned to go beyond what is 'in fashion' and have learned what my style is and how to express that style. I have raised many pets and made many great, lasting friendships as I have moved  and experienced life. I have had good days and bad days.
What an amazing 25 years I have had, especially just in the last 7 years since I graduated from high school. And you know even though I may not be where I thought I would be by this time in my life, right where I am is a pretty good place to be! The future doesn't look al that bad either. Just imagine what the next 25 years could bring and all the adventures that are just beyond my view, I can hardly wait to get started on the next two and a half decades! Graduations from collage, a career, possibly marriage and a family, new friends, new places to see, new adventures to have... it's all just so exciting!!!

This picture is one that I submitted into a scholarship contest! Pretty cool huh, wish me luck!!!

First Week of School in Review

Whew... I have finally gotten a class schedule in place that works, I only had to redo it twice this week. My final schedule is on Mondays and Wednesdays I have D&C at 8am, Flower Arranging at 10 and Landscape Contracts at 3. Tuesdays and Thursdays I have Landscape Computer Operations at 8am and Irrigation at 3, also on Thursdays I meet with the PLANET group to prepare for our competition in April.
So with no class on fridays and plenty open space during the other days I will most likley never have homework and will have plenty of free time, now I've just got to figure out what to do with my fridays. It makes me wish I had a job so I could work all day friday, oh well maybe I'll find something before the end of the semester!
I have the weather for Rexburg and Newport both on my desktop and I had to chuckle today as I looked at the differences. Rexburg is at 30 with 31 as the high and 26 as the low for the day where Newport is at 69 and has highs of 72 and lows of 46. What a difference, it was in the negatives this morning when I left the house, my car didn't want to start it was so cold and it's perfect swimming weather in sunny CA, it's enought o make me want to move right back down there!

Back to School to Prove I'm not a Fool

Classes started today and I thought I had everything all in order and was good to go, that is until I got to my second class and found out about an unlisted pre-requisite which meant I got to rearrange my schedule ARGHHHHHHHHHH! What a mess. I am retaking a class just to get the needed credits to be full time and well as some classes that I don't need for my major or minor. Frustrations!!! Hopefully now I have it all mashed out and in order, cross my fingers because I am out of luck if I have to rearrange again!

Pictures!!!

So I have been promising to put pictures from my drive home on my blog, now that I am back on campus I can do so! So Here they are, the first ones are from in the Valley of Fire. It was later in the evening so we had little time in the light, which is why I need to go back someday. There was so much to see! The first picture is next to the cabins that were built to provide shelter to travelers.

There were lots of petrogliphs and pictographs on the way to what is known as the Mouses Hole, which is a natural water retantion basin,something that's very important in an area with little to no water. It is named after a bandit that hid in the hills around there.

Here's a picture from driving home, including pictures from the inside to show how full my car was. We even managed to fit a few more boxes in after this picture was taken!

Here are some from the beach with my Daddy! We went to Newport Beach and to the tip of Balboa Pinesula. There have been times latley with all this snow that I wish I could go play on the beach in the warm sunshine, oh well. One day I will go back and visit!

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Santa Claus Been Here!!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS! As usual Santa was very good to us at the Pond household. I was pleasently surprised to receive a really nice Kelty backpack from my parents. I have been wanting a really good, women's back pack to take hiking and camping but hadn't found one that I liked, or that I could afford being a very poor collage student. It is a really nice backpack with cute little feminine touches like the little designs that are sewn on in places. I also got some movies and books and a fun little glass jar that I put the sand I brought back from California in with some of my favorite shells I found so that I can look at that and be reminded of the fun I had on the beaches! Thank you to everyone for the gifts, I was thourally spoiled!!!
One of the highlights of the morning was watching te dogs with their presents, they always know they also get presents and until they are produced from under te tree both Abbie and Cuddles sit in the middle of the floor witha  worried expression on their faces and when we finally pull out their present they get so excited. I haven't taught them to open presents yet, I try but they don't get it. One of their presents was a bag on rawhide bones, Abbie picked one out and happily went off to chew on it for te next half hour. Cuddles on the other hand alwasy seems to think that there is one that is better than the one he has and he's not content until he's empited out the entire bag. Unlike past years this bag had a closure and so he spent te morning trying to tear into the bag and carried this bag that was half his size around. What a funny puppy!
My job cleaning the collage housing hasn't been to bad. We work in groups of 4-6 and it takes us about 20 min. to clean one dorm. We got a four day weekend, which has been great! We're all supposed to come back in on monday, though I'm not sure what we will be doing as we've gotten all the rooms cleaned already. On wednesday I was sort of in charge of a crew of six as I had the list of what we were supposed to do and the keys to unlock the apartment doors. We were going back through some of the apartments at university village which is married housing, trying to get everything spick and span for the new families moving in next semester.
My poor mom cut her hand on a broken glass christams morning, she didn't want to go in yesterday so my dad bandaged it all up but last night they got to thinking perhaps they should get it looked at. It was too late for stitches when I ran my mom in this morning but the doctor did give her some antibiotic ointment to help keep it from getting infected.
My dad and Jed have been busy all day installing my Mom's new kitchen floor. She has wanted a new floor for years and now she is gettting it. It's a linolum type material that looks like wood, it looks really good int e kitchen and is going to to great when they are all done! My mom is super excted taht she Is finally getting her floor!

Who Turned Out the Lights?

Thursday night we had a huge blackout up here in the Upper Valley that affected people from Ashton down to Rigby, some even said parts of Idaho Falls, for those of you unfamiliar with the area, it takes about an hour to drive from Ashton to Rigby, and another 15 minutes to get to Idaho Falls so it was a huge blaackout. The paper today said it was caused by a damaged and malfunctioning part, or something like that. The power was out for over three hours, and as my Dad was saying it was "darker than the inside of a cow!" There was little to no moon so it really was dark when te power went out arround 8pm. Luckily we stayed nice and toasty warm next to the wood stove and we had plenty of lanterns and candles to give us light. It was kind of fun to only have candle light and was almost like stepping back in time.
I have been busy sewing up a storm making dog coats, I have even sold some! it has been kind of fun using my creative side to make each coat unique and adding little embellishments, buttons, bows and flowers to spruce them up! I am kind of sad because I start a job up on campus to help with cleaning the dorms and such over the break and I'm not sure I'll have any time to make more coats, I have been trying to get stocked up and made 14 coats yesterday alone! they are msotly for smaller dogs, as that is what my mom grooms and I have been selling them for $10.00 apeice. Perhaps what I don't sell this winter I will sell next fall at the local farmers market, if they hold it again.

I recently found out that I was selected to compete on my schools team at the PLANET competition in April, which is a very big national competition. I am really excited, yet nervous at the same time because last year my school took 1st place, so those are big shoes to try and fill. I get to compete in the Business Management, Interior Plant ID and Interiorscaping Design. I have alot of studying and preping to do in the next four months to get ready!!!

Baby... It's COLD Outside!!!

Wow, life has been busy! I have pictures to post about my drive home from California but as they are on my laptop and I am writing from the home computer the pictures will just have to wait, including the picture of my fully loaded car for my roomies to see, I still can't believe it all fit! I have been home about 2 1/2 weeks now. It's good to be home but I do miss California and all my friends there. The day after I got home it snowed, nice welcome home huh! It has been snowing off and on ever since and now everything is coated in a nice layer of snow, making everything look like it's been sugar coated, the only problem is that is hasn't gotten any warmer than about 15 degrees in the last few days.
 I have been job hunting but being Rexburg as usual there are no jobs to be found. I have started making dog coats to sell in my mom's shop, hopefully I can sell some and make some money to pay the bills with but if nothing else it has kept me from going crazy with boredom. I mad one that fits my dog Abbie that is pink with a red skirt, she looks adorable in it but she is less than enthusiastic about wearing that coat much less being my model as I make new ones, she hates being dressed up!
Well I hope that everyone is doing well and to any who are reading this, besides me, Merry Christams!!!

The End of an Adventure

Well this is my last week in California and boy is it going to be busy! My last day of work is on tuesday and my Dad flies in wednesday afternoon to help me drive home. I'm really excited to see my family and be going home but as the end of my time here draws to a close I find that I am sad to be leaving all my new friends and the area I have come to enjoy being in. I will definatly have to come back even if only to visit.
 I got to go camping in the beautiful Joshua Tree National Park this weekend with my singles ward. I had a gerat time shooting guns, and watching the rock climbing and bouldering. The only draw back was that I had a little cold when I went and unfortuantly the cold night air and lack of sleep due to being cold didn't help with the cold and what was a small irritaion has since blossomed into a full out cough complete with sore throat and runny nose, which is why I only watched the rock climbing activities rather than fully joining in. This cold couldn't have come at a worse time as I have so much to do and it is really slowing me down, or at least trying to. The battle is one, now we just have to wait and see who wins- me or the germs.
Here are some pictures from my trip !

Sunrise- time was 7am

Natalie and I on the hill after the morning hike, we had a great view!

Joshua trees everywhere!

Natalie climbing "The Wall"

 Hidden Canyons where we went climbing was like a rock climbers heaven, they were all over the place like a bunch of little spiders climbing the rock faces. It was fun to watch! I dubbed myself the official climbing groupie for the day!

A Whole New World

Well I had a great friday night. Surprise surprise I went to Disneyland. I went to the Aladdin show and it was GREAT!!! They had flying carpets, elephants and camels as well as great dancing, singing and of course the Genie, Aladdin and Jasmine. It was a great play.
After the play I went and rode some rides that I hadn't been on yet, made friends with a little girl named Elle who was in line behind me with her family and was very excited to go on the ride, and caught up on some phone calls to friends while I waited.

While in line one of my friends called and asked what I was up to. I told him where I was and that I would love company, as I really am getting tired of spending time alone, so he came and hung out with me. We caught two showings of Fantasmic, rode a couple of rides and got soaking wet on splash mountain. It was alot of fun!

Happy Halloween!!!

Well I had a spooktacular halloween this year. I started off the weekend with a ward party on friday night at Bro and Sis Packers home. They had chili and soup in a pumpkin and home made rootbeer... YUMMY!

There were also some great costumes. There was Carl and Russell from the movie UP and MJ, a Facebook and many others. I went as a witch!

There was also bobbing for apples and donuts on a string!

Saturday night I went to teo parties. I started off the night at my friend Rachel's house up in Orange and had dinner in a pumpkin with her and her husband. I then ran home to touch up my make-up and pick-up my roomate Nacolynn before heading to our friend Wendy and Marci's house for a party. Their house looked great! The three roomates that live there all dressed as Lady Gaga!

The UP Characters were also at the party but this time they brought Kevin the bird with them.

There were so many people there and so many good treats to snack on. As the night went on people slowly filtered out. Later in the evening they had  music so people could dance and they played The Birds movie on the fence using a projector. it was fun to see all the costume ideas and to talk and get to know everyone better and to meet new people!            

    Here are some pictures from the House of Gaga party!

Just another day at the office

So today we had a bit of excitement at work, okay so it was alot of excitement. We spent the entire morning closing out a deal that we have been working on for over two weeks. The job was for  the California Transportation Department or Cal Trans as we call it at work. Our bid had to be out at 9am this morning, the people we were bidding to had to have theirs in to the job owners at two pm. I found out that with these kinds of bids if you are even 10 seconds late they won't take your bid. We bid to seven of the eight bidders vying for the job. At 2pm we were all anxiously waiting to hear if our bid had been accepted. When the bidding time closes the sealed bid packages are opened one at a time and the total sum is read out loud to all waiting. The lowest bid wins. One of my co-workers was there so we could know the verdict as soona s it was announced and guess what... WE GOT IT!!! We were so excited!

We bid on the landscaping and erosion control and with jsut those two things we got the job for the healthy sum of $7.5 million, whew! That brought out monthy total up to almost $12 million, that's twice as much as they have ever made in a single month before, the largest before was $6 million in April of 2006. We get to have a pizza party in celebration and the teo guys who did the estimating on landscaping and erosion control got a day off, compliments of the boss man himself in appreciation for a job well done and in recognition of the long hours they both put into the job!

One cool thing about this job was that I did the take off for it, so in a way I helped get the job. That's pretty cool to be able to say that I helped bring in one of the largest jobs Marina had ever bid on!

Last night my roomate Nacolynn and I went to Yogurtland with our friend Austin. It was really good. It was cool because they figure price based on the ounces of stuff in your cup. They had about 20 diffrent flavors and you could put as many or as few in your cup as you want, You also get to chose your own toppings if you want them. I had pistacio, tart blackberry and cheesecake with blackberries and gummy worms on top!