Peppermint Peanut Butter Ice Cream.

This week at the Helaman Creamery we accidentally unveiled a new ice cream flavor: Peppermint Peanut Butter. This ice cream was somehow accidentally made by the BYU ice cream factory and then delivered to our store to be sold. Surprisingly, this ice cream is actually really good. It looks like peppermint ice cream with pieces of peanut butter cups mixed in with it. However, it tastes like peanut butter ice cream, but every once in a while it tastes kind of minty. The flavors never mix though. One second you taste just the peanut utter and the next second you taste only mint.

It has become quite a hit and we are almost completely out. I was tentative to like it in the first place for this exact reason. I knew that it was a fluke and that we would never get it again. I will miss this ice cream dearly. it was fun while it lasted. And who knows, maybe enough people will have liked it that they will have to make it a regular flavor.

German Choir.

This is the second semester that I have taken German Choir. Basically, we just get together and sing songs in German. There are no language requirements or previous singing experience necessary to take the course.

I thought that not requiring previous singing experience would make the songs easy to learn. However, this semester all of the songs have been extremely difficult. We are preparing for the Adventsingen in December. We were expecting to sing songs like Silent Night and O Christmas Tree. Instead, we are singing several Baroque pieces that nobody has ever heard of.

With such difficult music, I expected to be fully engaged in class trying to learn the notes. But for the past 3 classes, I have actually fallen asleep while singing. I don't think anybody has noticed yet. While I love to sing, I also love to nap. It's a win-win situation.

Extreme Couponing.

I would like to become an extreme couponer someday. An extreme couponer is able to buy hundreds of dollars worth of groceries for mere pennies. These people also donate tons of food to local food pantries that they got for free.

Unfortunately, I don not think I can ever actually become an extreme couponer. It takes an average of 40 hours a week to collect, cut, and plan. Who has that kind of time? Even a stay at home mom doesn't have that kind of time. Who is watching the children? But its fun to imagine how much money one could save with all of those coupons floating around.

Since I discovered extreme couponing, I have paid more attention to the coupons that I see everywhere around me. Although I still don't really use them. The one thing I have used was to get a gallon of chocolate for a dollar. But I didn't need the chocolate milk, I only bought it because I had a coupon, which is the whole point of coupons!

Procrastination at its Worst.

I am a procrastinator. I'm not really ashamed because who isn't a procrastinator is some way or another? But this year it seems like my procrastination has become worse than ever. This is because I am taking three writing classes this semester. I hate writing more than any other school task, so this semester has felt like torture.

My procrastination in the past usually involved leaving homework assignments until the night before they were due and then working on them until about 2:00 in the morning. While this situation was never desirable (especially in my senior year of high school when I got up at 5:00am for a zero period choir class), I was able to manage it.

Jump to this year. All of my assignments are now writing papers which means that I have even more motivation to procrastinate than ever. While I used to stay up and finish homework before going to bed, I have now taken to the habit of going to bed at a reasonable hour and waking up at 5:00 to complete my assignments. I have to get ready for school at 7:00 which means I complete the majority of my homework in a rushed two hour period every morning.

I used to not be ashamed of my procrastination, but now I am. There is no excuse for going to bed when I have homework. (Exhaustion is not a good excuse.) So I am hoping that by admitting that I have a problem publicly, I will be motivated to get things done a bit earlier so that I can get a full eight hours of sleep every night (Ha!).

Arches National Park.

Over Labor Day Weekend, I went with my roommate, KaeCee, and her friend, Rita, to Arches National Park. We hiked to some of the easier arches and then camped at a nearby campsite that night. Here are some highlights from our trip:

Double Arch

Turret Arch

These arches were probably the easiest to get to because there were stairs rather than steep paths. The best arches were the ones that you could stand underneath like Double Arch. I didn't want to climb up too far, so I found a nice flat rock and laid in the shade of the Double arch while Rita and KaeCee climbed up further. I was surprised by all of the German tourists there were at the park. I loved walking behind them and listening to their conversations that they thought nobody else could understand. Sometimes I thought about talking to them, but I'm not confident enough with my speaking skills yet.

Pine Tree Arch

This was my favorite arch that we saw. It was hidden down a small trail. The whole arch was emerged in shade by the time we got there and there were a lot of green plants at its base. I could have stayed here all day.

Northern Whiptail Lizard

We saw a lot of different kinds of lizards. This one was probably the most impressive because it was big and it was "dancing" in an attempt to scare us away. Other wildlife we saw in the park were ravens and bugs. But on our drive to the park we say a herd of some kind of deer. And driving home I saw a coyote hanging out with some ravens. I now think ravens are one of the scariest animals in the world.

Our Campsite

This is our campsite that we stayed at. I think it only cost $6 for the night and it was a large site. We played a few games before it got too dark to see and then we made dinner and looked at the stars. It was still pretty hot at night, so we slept with only the tent screen door up. I am generally fine with camping until it comes time to sleep. I just don't like being outside at night, ever. Especially if I have to sleep in a tent without locks where I could easily be murdered or eaten in my sleep. So when the open tent door started flapping in the wind, I got freaked out and couldn't sleep. But I was also too afraid to open the screen and zip up the door, so I sat up in the middle of the night for over an hour just staring at the door, wishing for it to stop moving.

Jiffy Pop

I made Jiffy Pop over the coals of the fire even though the instructions said not to. I also did not burn any of the popcorn, which I was told always happens when one makes Jiffy Pop. It was fun because I had never done it before. So even if it is not the most efficient way to make popcorn, it is worth the experience.

* Pictures from KaeCee Terry

Random Pictures from my Phone.

Since I got my new phone at the beginning of the summer, I have been collecting random pictures of things that I see and think are funny or memorable. But I often forget about these pictures and then they never get shown to anybody. So this will be my way of unloading the camera from my phone to finally share all of these images.

This is from a hot air balloon race on Pioneer Day. These balloons were landing in the practice field right outside of my apartment. I enjoyed sitting on the stairs on watching them that morning. I also had an interesting conversation with a guy parked in his car who was also watching the balloons.

Over the summer, the BYU duck pond was home to many ducklings. On this occasion, Steven and I were looking for the babies and I said "Maybe they are behind this tree." And they actually WERE behind the tree. They were all taking an afternoon nap in the shade.

This is what happens when you buy toilet paper at Costco. My roommate, KaeCee, and I went bowling with these rolls and a beach ball. It was a lot of fun.

This is what 60 McDonald's chicken nuggets looks like. That was after the guys had already consumed 40 of them. Gross!

I saw this license plate walking to work one day. I know the actual plural form of wife is wives, but at first glance, this looked like this was multiple wives instead of the possessive of one wife. Perfect for a Utah license plate.

These are some of my finds at Walmart. A white trash wedding cake topper and hair mayonnaise? I found it in the section of the store for black people hair products. I'm not sure what it does. My first guess was that it killed lice.

Finally, here are my pumpkins from this Halloween. In case you can't tell, that is Pacmanchasing one of the Pacman ghosts.

Fall Television.

I generally do not watch much television any given week. This is not because I don't watch any tv though. There is a multitude of shows that I watch during the fall season, but it always seems like there are only two new episodes any given week because of weird scheduling. Unfortunately, that was not the case this week. For one of the first times ever, every show I watch had a new episode this week. It has turned into quite an overload, but is somehow perfect for my night of doing absolutely nothing. Here is a list of the shows I watch with brief descriptions of each:

Glee

Glee is about a high school Glee club, which is basically a glorified show choir. I like this show because it reminds me of my days in my high school's theatre. A lot of the people on the show are relatable to people I knew in our theatre.

Bones

Bones is about a forensic anthropologist and a FBI agent who work together to solve murders by looking at the bones of the victim. This season is especially good because two very important characters have finally gotten together.

Modern Family

Modern Family is about a family and their many quirks. I love this show, but it lives on awkward situations. There are times when the awkwardness in this show is just too real for me though.

The Office

This show is about a small town paper company and the people who work there. Like Modern Family, this show also lives on awkwardness. Again, the awkwardness can be too real for me a lot of the times. (Especially in the Dinner Party episode).

Psych

Psych is about a psychic detective agency, but the "psychic" isn't really psychic, he is just very observant. This show always makes me laugh, but I think that I would get more of the jokes if I grew up in the 80's.

Whitney

The newest addition to my Fall line up is Whitney. This is about a long term couple and the things that happen after you have been dating for such a long time. This is kind of different because I feel like most shows focus either on people having one night stands or people starting new relationships. I like this show because there are some definite things that I can relate to in it that just make me laugh.