Sunday, January 24, 2016

isabelle jane.

earlier this year i met isabelle jane. she turned out to be one of my best friends ever. this girl has got a heart of gold and lives way too far away from me (san diego to be exact)

she was down in provo a couple of weeks ago dropping her older brother off at the MTC. we took advantage of how close we were & met up at the BYU art museum. we walked around BYU's campus for a bit talking and catching up on life.
 one of the worst thing about knowing really great people is the fact that you have to miss them sometimes. even though not seeing her every day sucks, i feel so blessed to know her. god put this human in my life for a reason - no coincidence here.

Saturday, January 23, 2016

happy 19th karina.

on january 13th one of my best friends turned 19... not just any best friend but my very first best friend.

me and karina were attached at the hip since before i can even remember, we've been playing together since we were in diapers. 
as time has gone on karina & i haven't spent as much time together as we use to in the past; but our friendship  hasn't ever change. no matter how long we go without a lunch date or a movie night - we'll still be as close as ever.

one of the best things about our friendship is that there is never drama between us. sure we've had our stingy moments (who hasn't?!) but it's always blows over quickly. we've never had a real fight or argument EVEN through the jr. high and high school, can you believe that? it's been 19 SOLID years of friendship.
for karina's birthday we threw her a little surprise party with pizza, cake, icecream, and lots of friendship. by 'we' i mean a few of us a came up with the idea all together and then kenna (her roomate - who is also doubles of my favorite people EVER) stressed and slaved over the party for the next week. you go kenna! 
she was surprised and her apartment was full of pink and gold. it couldn't of been more perfect.
i sure love my sweet, beautiful, talented, lovely, karina. here's to the many more years of friendship come.

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

kinz&kev.

the week of christmas two of the greatest people i know sealed the deal. mckinzie and kevin are two of the most loving, kind, and caring people i know. they've always been so concerned for me & my well being. i can truly tell they want the best for me - and i couldn't appreciate that more.


kinz and i had mutal friends through jr. high & we officially met in high school once we started dancing together. it wasn't hard to get close with her, she was someone that could always tell when i was struggling and needed someone to talk to. we'd share secrets together, cry together, laugh together, tell dirty jokes together, ect. although we don't see each other every day anymore, our relationship hasn't changed a bit. it's nice having someone to completely confide in (especially when they confide in you right back) i'll never be able to repay her for always letting me come sleep in her bed when it was midnight and i didn't want to go home - but i also didn't want to be alone in my car. 

i can't even count the number of nights where we stayed up way too late having deep heart to hearts - or amount of days we went to lunch together and missed majority of fourth period because we couldn't stop talking each others ear's off.


i'll never forget when i broke my toe (and didn't know it was broken yet so i didn't have crutches) my foot wouldn't fit in any of my shoes so i was hobbling up 'the drag' in a fuzzy sock. it took me about 20 minutes to even make it to the school building and who know's how long it would've taken for me to get to class (i was already so late.) kinz walked out of the school to see me struggling and a few minutes later she saw her boyfriend (kevin) in the parking lot getting out of his car, she told him to go carry me to class - and so he did. he ran up to the school and carried me the rest of the way to class.

you get it... they are amazing humans.
kinz & kev had such a beautiful, awesome day. i was so happy to be apart of it. 

Tuesday, January 19, 2016

your best phyisical self.

a few months ago i was accepted as a write/blogger for BE WISE MAGAZINE. BE WISE is a magazine that focus's on uplifting others and inspiring the readers to recognize their self worth. each month of 2016 BE WISE will launch a new issue of their "BE YOUR BEST SELF" magazine. january's topic is "PHYSICALLY" i was honored to have my first article written published in this magazine. you can download the first 26 pages of BE YOUR BEST SELF PHYSICALLY for free here.

i ended up being really proud of my article - probably because this is a topic that i am passionate about. since i hold this topic so near and dear to my heart, i wanted to share my article over here too:

{“Generally when you see the topic “be your best self physically.” You probably jump to the thought of “getting healthy and fit” which generally leads to an assumption that we’re about to read an article about the newest diet, how to lose weight, how to tone up, and how to look like a supermodel, because that is what this world likes to target. Think about it for a minute, what do these articles do for us? Do they really make us “better physically?” Maybe occasionally for a day, or a week. But majority of the time it does nothing for us physically, and instead hurts emotionally, leaving our self esteem at a new level of low. Lets be honest, who can really wake up at 5 am everyday to run 6 miles before school or work, still show up looking perfect, then to get home and eat green leaves for every meal, with never indulging in a favorite treat? Chances are, very few people, and the ones who can probably have more serious problems. The people that seem like they have it all together, the perfect diet, the best exercise routines, ect. I can guarantee they don’t. Thinking that we can have it all together leads us to ‘fail’ at ‘perfection’ leaving us feeling worse about ourselves then we did in the first place.
Sure, eating our fruits and veggies is important, but eating our cake and ice cream is important too. Yes, exercising and "movement" are good for us, but rest is good for us too. This society has a very skewed view on health. Health isn’t starving ourselves, ignoring our cravings, and pushing our bodies past their limits in cardio. Physical Health is satisfying cravings, honoring our hunger, allowing ourselves to rest, and trusting our bodies to tell us what they need.

One main point that i want to be clear on, is we need to take care of ourselves. We need to be gentle, kind, and patient with ourselves. We need to speak to our selves in a more compassionate tone. I believe that we can not be our best physically if we’re focused on changing our bodies. Before passing up the chocolate and reaching for carrots instead, ask yourself “what are my motives?” Before putting on your nikes and heading out for a run instead of watching a movie with the family, ask yourself, “what’s fueling this decision?” Are you motivated because you love your body, and want to take care of it? Or are you motivated because you hate your body and you’re trying to slim down? I’ve realized the hard way, that if we think we’ll be happy with ourselves as soon as we reach our goal weight, or as soon as we tone our stomachs, we’re wrong! When our lives are based around changing our appearance, we’ll never be satisfied, and we’ll never know when enough is enough. If we want to love ourselves, we need to put our time and energy into embracing and accepting our bodies, not changing them.
We often think we can mold and shape our bodies as if they’re lumps of clay, but it isn’t true. Each body is different, each body is made up of different genetics. One common mistake this society makes is comparing, you wouldn’t compare a tuna sandwich to a PB&J, so why compare yourself (or more specifically your body) to another? No two people were created to look the exact same, we were creatd to look EXACTLY how god intended for each of us - individually - to look. We should embrace the fact that we weren’t built to look like the girl next to us, it makes us unique and special.

I believe that in order to be our best selves physically, we need to be intuitive eaters. In the book “Intuitive Eating” written by Evelyn Tribole and Elyse Resch, they give us 10 steps to becoming intuitive eaters, a few of those steps that I especially cherish are: rejecting the diet mentality, make peace with food, and discover the satisfaction factor.
Food is meant to be enjoyed, no one is going to be happy living with a “food police” on their shoulder. With each new diet we  attempt, we fuel that food police more & more.
If we want to be our healthiest self, we need to shift from a diet approach, to a self care approach.
Although it may be hard to believe, dieting is one of the worst things we can do to ourselves.
Sure, sometimes we’ll lose weight from the latest diet, but the only thing that weight loss actually gives us is false sense of control and confidence, in reality, body acceptance rarely improves. On top of that, as soon as we’re off the diet we’ll end up gaining all the weight back, plus 10%. Unless we make lifestyle changes nothing is going to permanently change, there is no quick and easy when it comes to our weight and that’s because our each person has a “natural set point”.  Our bodies know what weight it’s comfiest at, and our bodies will fight to stay there, even if it does require speeding up, or slowly down our metabolism.
Often times our attempt to diet and to restrict certain food groups is what leads us to overeating, and then gaining weight. Think about it, when you start a diet, what do you do? Spend the whole day beforehand eating all the things you soon won’t allow yourself to have. If you tell yourself “I’m only going to eat two more bites of ice-cream” you’ll probably end up eating the two biggest bites of ice-cream you’ve ever had…. and then sneaking a third. If your mom is making cookies and you promise yourself not to eat one single cookie, you’ll probably eat mass amounts of cookie dough. As soon as we make something “off-limits” we will suddenly want it much more, this will make watching our calories much harder to achieve. So, why not make all foods available options when snack time rolls around? Why not let our cravings make the decision, instead of the food police?
Our bodies are really incredible and we don’t give them the credit they deserve. Our body knows what it wants, and it naturally craves the things it needs. There’s a reason everyone thinks they are “always craving carbs”, and that’s because our body needs a lot of carbs each and every day, after all, it is our body's main source of energy. We burn through them quickly, which leaves us wanting more, but that’s okay, because they are our fuel.
The thought of truly allowing ourselves to eat what we crave, when we crave it, is scary. This is only scary because it’s so foreign, we’re surrounded by people telling us what to eat, when to eat it, what to never eat, ect. We’re constantly being told that listening to our bodies is wrong, and it will lead to weight gain, but I promise, trusting your body may just turn into the best decision you’ve ever made. You’ll never know the power your body has until you give it a chance to prove itself. We might think “if i give myself permission to eat what i’m craving, i’ll eat cookies all day!” but take a step back, if you only ate cookies all day, you’d get sick of them real quick and soon enough you would be craving a crisp salad, or a juicy apple. Our bodies know what they want, and they know what to do with the food we give it. Food fuels our metabolism, and keeps it running.
It’s time we put down the diet books, and take off our fitbit’s. Exercise doesn’t have to be a miserable time on the treadmill, it can be running around in the back yard with your nieces, it can be a bike ride around a lake with your best friend, it can be playing ‘Just Dance’ against your dad. Eating a favorite treat doesn’t have to be ‘earned’ and indulging doesn't have to lead to guilt, and regret.
If we want to be at our physical prime, we need to stop trying to “get there,” and start considering that maybe we already are there. If we wait until we “look better” to accept ourselves, we’ll spend a long, tiring, depressing life at war with ourselves. There’s no better time to start accepting ourselves then today, right this second. It’s time to get rid of our diet rules, and to instead, just trust ourselves. We need to step back, and accept what is, we need to embrace ourselves, flaws and all, and trust our god given machine.”}


don't forget to check out the be wise website, blog, and magazine. also, make sure you download the first pages of the best be your best self PHYSICALLY magazine here.

Sunday, January 17, 2016

when you throw a 3 year old a party.

 if you throw a 3 year old a party; she's going to need lots of gold and glitter in her outfit.....

me & chels went shopping for paisley's birthday outfit and we couldn't find anything just right for a decent price. i decided that with some gold spray paint and a $4 hobby lobby t-shirt i could make something fabulous; and so i did!
 






see more of paisley's party here.

Monday, January 11, 2016

new years eve.

after paisley's birthday party on new years eve, i headed over to cute caroline's house where me and some of my best friends met up. we eventually made our way on over to the UVU dance.



our night was full of dancing as we celebrated the end of 2015 and the beginning of 2016. it was the perfect way to ring in the new year. happy 2016 everyone!

Sunday, January 10, 2016

2015 wrap up.

2015..... WHAT. A. FREAKING. YEAR. it was an unforgettable one no doubt. 

some highlights of the year...

welcoming sweet maycie to the family.
(then disappearing off the face of the year for some months)

turning 18.

being able to attend sr. dinner dance.


being able to go to sr. prom.


being able to not only graduation seminary & higschool, but ATTEND those graduations.


making unbelievably AMAZING friendships (these girls have turned out to be some of my best friends.)

becoming pen pals with (and meeting) stephanie nielson.

being able to go on a 'senior trip' to disney land with my older sister.

another "graduation" of sorts.

an unreal trip to hawaii.

celebrating the holiday's with my sweet family.

annnnnd so much more. what a fabulous year. i wish i had more words to say about 2015 (and in all honestly i just have too many words to say about 2015. i can't process them all and it'd take ages to type them all up) but it was a good one. an unbelievably challenging and hard one - but a good one.

Friday, January 8, 2016

happy 1st maycie moo.

on tuesday my sweet niece maycie turned one. i can't believe it's been a whole year since this sweet little thing arrived.
^^look at her pony tail and tell me you're not dying. could she be any cuter?!^^
 

                                               
                              not sure when, but at some point we started calling maycie "maycie moo" which eventually turned into "moo moo"

for miss "moo moo" we had a farm animal themed party.
she wasn't interested in opening presents, so her older sister opened them for her. 
she had absolutely no idea what was happening, but she ran around her party as happy as could be.


^^ how perfect was her smash cake?!^^

if you remember how she handled her own piece of cake here you can obviously guess why we thought her "cake smash" would be super eventful. surprisingly enough, she wasn't super into it. her dad eventually stuck her hands in the cake then wiped some frosting on her face. she was upset and mad. so that ended that.

i'm so glad i never have to live in a world without miss maycie sage in it again. this sweet girl knows how to make her family happy. we love you moo moo.

******************************

i still remember so so perfectly the first week of little maycie's life. 
 

they grow up way too fast.
see my post about when maycie was born here