And Straight on 'Till Morning

So I realize I haven't posted since school started, but in my defense, I've been busy. I'm taking 17 credits this semester and barely keeping afloat. The day before yesterday I spent at least 9 hours and 45 minutes either in class or doing homework, (yes I subtracted lunch and breaks). Yesterday I was in class for six hours spent an hour working on sewing after class, didn't eat lunch until 3 and then spent three hours on my econ homework due the next day. I sincerely tried to do more homework afterward, but Levinas has a very difficult vocabulary and I just wasn't up to concentrating that hard so I read King Lear instead (admittedly my paper on King Lear is due in just under two weeks!!). In better news I finished all the major seams in Jared's PJ pants, and he tried them on. They fit! ... mostly. I'm going to have to take some off the bottom and it'll be a trick to keep the waistband as high as he wants it. It turns out he has a lot of height in his to...

School has started. Today is the first official second day of school. (Tuesday and Wednesday both counted as first days because they were both all new classes.) Probably the most exciting thing about school finally starting was that it was so easy. Not that the school work, or the classes are going to be easy, but that it was so easy to slip back into school mode, school routine. I guess I never really realized how much I love my routine. It makes life simpler and easier to deal with, even when I have a hundred things to do and not much time to do them in. I have spent much of the last two days updating my google calendar. Until now I have used a paper planner for my scheduling needs. However, over the break I noted that none other than my very own mother uses google calendar. I also know one or two other people who use google calendar. So I decided to give it a try. It's great! I mapped out my blocks of class time before coming back and have been adding other events as they come...

  I can't wait for school to start!!!  I'm really excited to start a new semester. I've always liked the feeling of being able to start over fresh, but this time is even better. I got three A's and two A-'s this last semester and it has left me feeling like I really can do anything. I've become a better student, and I understand better how important it really is to put lots of time into all of my classes in order to get good grades in them. I've also realized that in truth, time is the important thing. It's never that I'm not smart enough or not cut out for such and such, it's that I have to be willing to put in the time and effort to really excel. I can do things that are hard or that I'm not good at. I just have to be willing to work. And once I put in the time and effort and work I often realize that it's really not that hard. My father once accused me of being a hypochondriac. Although I resented that accusation I have come to real...

And the summary continues . . . Christmas morning I woke up and heard Mom, Dad, and Jackson talking. Jackson got in bed with Mom and Dad to keep warm, then Carli woke up and went to join them. I could hear them talking about me so I spoke up and said I was warm where I was. However, eventually I got up and went to join them in their bed. It was a king size bed, but it was still a bit of a squeeze to fit all five of us under the covers at once. My dad read us Luke 2 and then we all got up and ready to go do stockings. In my stocking I found an apron that said “Queen of Everything” on it (that was as close as they could find to Princess of the World), a beautiful scarf that I jokingly fashioned as a burka (reminiscent of the domestic violence lecture), an oven mitt with a pattern of snowflakes, medicated lip balm for extremely dry lips, and fingernail clippers and files. After stockings were done, we sang some songs, and my dad played his guitar, for a Christmas program that my sist...

So as you may or may not know my family spent Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in a yurt on Tamarak resort. I don't like traveling and I would have much rathered stay home for Christmas but we went anyway and I did have fun. The following is a summary of key events. On the way to Donnelly we listened to a lecture on domestic violence. The speaker told all kinds of stories from women in the US pushed around by their husbands to women in Muslim countries who get sprayed with sulfuric acid if they allow their faces to be seen. Then my mom and dad proceeded to give us the same lecture that my mom has given several times. “If your boyfriend tries to control you, frightens you, intimidates you, or hurts you in any way; that is the end of the relationship and you never speak to him again. If your husband does any of those things you take your kids and all the money in your accounts and leave him. The first time.” I absolutely agree. Finally, just outside of Donnelly, we go to the hot sp...

So, I just saw this really cool video on BYU's home page, and I thought I'd share it with you. If you want you can also check out the article at . Thought of You from Ryan J Woodward on Vimeo .

I've been studying MCom (mass communications) all morning, and I need a break. So, let me tell you about my scripture study this morning. Since yesterday I've been trying to study the principle of faith. Monday morning I started my study by reading about faith in the Bible dictionary. That day was mostly an overview of the principles I already knew. This morning I went over it again and a few things jumped out at me. The first thing was the definition of faith. The "seminary answer" to that is, "to hope for things that are not seen, but which are true." However, the part that jumped out at me this morning was a little bit different; "To have faith is to have confidence in something or someone . . . to place confidence in Him without reservation." The second thing was in concert with the principle "faith without works is dead." I switched the order of a few phrases in the third paragraph to emphasize their meaning. "[True faith]...