Lazy Man Challenge

BYU-Idaho is offering a lazy man challenge for the month of February. Participants have to bike 112 miles, swim 2.4 miles and run 26 miles. The first 100 people to finish the challenge win a free t-shirt. I decided that I would take up this challenge and see how quickly I can finish it, and for some reason free t-shirt is really motivational for me! I am not much of a runner, but I am pretty comfortable with the biking/spinning and swimming. So far I have swam 2.4 miles, ran 20 miles and biked 55 miles. My goal is to have the challenge completed by next week. I am trying really hard to force myself to like running, especially since I have the Color Run coming up in May. Elizabeth and I will be running the 5k Color Run in downtown Seattle and I cannot wait!!! Luckily the lazy man challenge is helping to get me into shape for the run and I should be ready to go in May if I keep up the running that I've been forcing myself to do.

I can't believe how fast this semester is going and that it is already February! It has always seemed like January, February and March are the longest months of the year, but so far it seems as though time is going by faster than ever. We are almost to mid-term week, which means that the second half of the semester is probably going to go faster than the first and I'll be back in Bellevue, getting ready for swim team before I know it! When I get home in April, I am going to apply to work at certain Elementary Schools around Bellevue as a IA (Instructor's Assistant) and start getting my foot in the door with some in classroom experience. I cannot wait!

I have been swimming on the swim team for about 3 weeks now and am really loving it! We had our first meet last week and WE WON!! I swam all freestyle in the meet and dropped 8 seconds from my 100 freestyle time trials time. I've forgotten how much I have missed swimming and competing. I am still getting back into the groove of water, but am proud of the progress I have made so far! I've met some really fun people and am excited to get to know the rest of the team better. Our suits, caps and shirts came in yesterday...I guess once a totem, always a totem....go red and black! We have a meet tomorrow...hopefully it goes well. Here's to hoping the rest of the season goes well!

Your Potential, Your Privileges

Happy Sunday! I figured that since it's Sunday, it would be pretty appropriate to share a Mormon Message clip that I came across earlier this week. The clip is called "Your Potential, Your Privileges." I love that all of the Mormon Messages contain such a sweet and powerful message in just a matter of minutes.

I love this message because it really reminds me to enjoy what I have right now and soak up every experience that comes my way. I am so blessed to have many wonderful blessings in my life and I, unfortunately, take a lot of those blessings for granted. When I do this, I am not taking advantage of what I have around me to help me live my life to its fullest potential. Life can get so crazy and hectic, but I'll never get this time of my life, or even today, back again. One of my goals for this year is to enjoy every experience I have to the fullest and to remember the things that I have already been blessed with. I know that as I am consciously doing this, I will be happier and be more ready for the experiences that will come my way in the future.

Recap 2012

I'm not sure if anyone looks at my blog anymore (I've been really bad about keeping this thing updated...I forgot that I had this, actually!). But I've decided I'm going to be better about using it this year!

Happy 2013!! I can't believe how fast 2012 came and went. It's crazy to think of everything that has happened in the last year. I'm so grateful for all of the experiences, fun times, bumps in the road and adventures that I've had in the last 12 months. I can say pretty confidently that I've learned a lot and wouldn't have had it any other way.

Here is a super quick recap of my last semester (Fall 2012 semester #3): I moved apartments with my previous roommate, Annie, and was lucky enough to also get to live two new roommates, Katie and Jessica. I was called to be the secretary in the Relief Society and met some pretty fun people in the ward! I took 15 credits, which normally is a pretty do-able work load, but with some really challenging classes (with lots and lots of tests), I ended up spending a lot more time focusing on my school work than I did last year...which payed off because I ended the semester with 4 A's and 2 B's!! To avoid stressing myself out and take a break from studying, I decided I would take up spinning. BYUI offers a gym and fitness classes free of charge to all of the students and faculty. My friend told me that by not taking advantage of this opportunity is like someone offering you $50 in return for nothing and you declining their offer...who wouldn't take the $50?! I went to the spinning classes in the gym 5 days a week for an hour each time. I LOVED every minute of it!!! I ended up biking a grand total of 1000 miles by the end of the semester :) I spent Thanksgiving with my Aunt Donna and Uncle Dean in Rupert, Idaho...which was so much fun!! The food was delicious and I loved getting to know them better! Plus, I got to shoot my first gun...thanks Uncle Dean!!

Semester #4 started 2 weeks ago and so far I'm really enjoying it. I'm taking mostly classes for my major (Elementary Education), which I love because I find myself looking forward to going to class and doing the homework. My teachers are all really nice...it seems like it should be a great semester of classes! My friend Josh has been trying to get me to swim on the school's swim team with him...I finally cracked and am all signed up ready to go! I'm excited because I love swimming and honestly miss it, but am nervous because it has been 2 years since I've swam competitively. We had time trials this past week and I AM SLOW!! Haha I'm hoping that with time I will get a little bit of my speed back...I'm a pretty swimmer, not a fast swimmer :) I'm excited to see what happens! My sister, Cadison, just started up her first semester and I think she is really liking it so far. It's been fun showing her the ropes! My calling for this semester is Activities Chair...which kind of makes me nervous because I'm not the most creative person so this should be interesting!! I seriously cannot believe how fast my sophomore year has gone by! It's crazy to think that in April I will be a JUNIOR in college and that I will be student teaching before I know it!!

That's pretty much it for right now...just taking life day by day and loving what comes!

Seattle Mania!

I promise I am still alive! It has been way too long since I've blogged but I've been busy and am finally getting around to it. I go back to school in TEN days! I am so excited and seriously cannot wait to see everyone again and start another fun and adventurous semester. Plus, I found out my favorite Coloradan is going to be riding on the bus with me from Salt Lake to Rexburg next week, which will make for a fun 5 hour drive :)

Earlier this month I went to downtown Seattle with Elizabeth and her roommate, Ester, to go spend time at the Pacific Science Center. My friend Thad recently moved to Seattle so we invited him to come along and it was SO much fun! (Well, except for the butterfly exhibit...didn't enjoy it at all!) After we went to eat lunch at Red Robin in Redmond.

I rode my first ferris wheel! My aunt, mom, sister and I spent the day in Seattle and had a great time. We rode the Great Seattle Ferris Wheel, strolled through Pike Place Market, added gum to the gum wall, had lunch at Ivars and visited my grandpa at work. Even though we live just a few minutes away from Seattle, we don't get the chance to go very often, so its always a good time when we do!

We also had the opportunity to go to a Mariner's game. My grandparents, mom and I were lucky enough to go to the yellow t-shirt King Felix night! Everyone was wearing bright yellow and holding up King Felix "K" signs. It was such a fun and relaxing night at the ball game. I don't know much about baseball but it definitely was fun to pretend like I knew what was going on. I am excited to go again next season! Go Mariners! (PS - they WON!!! This doesn't happen very often!)

Feeling Pretty Good

We had A champs today (for those that don't know what this is, it is the big championship with all 27 teams that are part of the league we swim in). It's safe to say that going into the meet, I was nervous. We spent all day Saturday, part of Sunday and Thursday night putting these line ups together. Every possible line up had been thought through and considered. No joke, we spent hours and hours and hours staring at the same 10 papers we had to go off of. Lucky for us, all of us coaches get along really well this year, which made all of this a little bit easier. Anyway, after some exciting, nerve wracking and even some "bummer" swims (1 relay DQ and 1 individual DQ), the points were tallied up and the results were announced.

FOURTH.

You read that right...Samena placed FOURTH!

Grant (one of my assistant coaches) and I literally screamed our heads off when this was announced. In the past, Samena hasn't place very well at A champs (usually any where from 10-15th), so this was huge! I seriously almost cried I was so happy. All of the hard work that we had put into the many hours and days of practices, meets, line ups and champ line ups had paid off!! Such a great feeling! I went from being so exhausted after a long day at the pool to overwhelmingly happy and excited. I know this is super cliche of me to put on here, but I really am so proud of my swimmers for all the hard work they have put into the season. I'm so grateful for the parents and especially my amazing parent reps that helped me out soooo much this summer...seriously couldn't have done any of this without them. I am super lucky to have the boys (my 3 other coaches) by my side, I am so glad that we were able to have such a strong team of coaches this year that worked so well together! Can't wait for next year...the stakes are high :)

I've got about a month until I go back to Rexburg...pretty crazy, huh?! I love being home but I'm definitely ready to be back. I'm going to be taking some really fun classes this year, which should be exciting. Oh, and I'm excited to see my Shmannalee and Mikele and all of my other buddies that I miss so much!

Pretty darn happy right about now :)

And the countdown begins...

3 more weeks and my summer can finally begin! I've been out of school since April, but work has taken up a lot of my time. The swim team season will be over in 3 weeks, and the day after the final championship meet, I am going camping for a week with my family for a huge family reunion. I am so excited to get away for a few days and enjoy a few days up in the mountains!

The theme for last week's home meet was super heroes. My grandma and I made the coaches some capes to wear at the meet. Usually I hate dressing up for the theme meets, but it was fun to wear the capes and I think the younger kids liked it.

Confession time: I didn't realize how short I am until I saw this picture! I laughed pretty hard when I saw how short I am next to these two giants. Tomorrow is team picture day, and lets just say, all 10 of my kick boards that I will be standing on are ready to go :)

I can't believe how fast this summer has been going so far. Pretty crazy to think that I've been home for 3 months already, and before I know it, it will be time to go back. I am so excited to get back to Rexburg and let the adventures begin. My classes are all signed up for and we got our living arrangement a few weeks ago, so now its just the waiting game!

Victory!

Last night we had our first swim meet, which was super scary as it was my first meet as the head coach.  When putting the meet together and getting in touch with the Edgebrook coach (our opposing team), I was shocked and a little frightened to hear that they have 270 swimmers....which is almost double the swimmers that I have! The boys (my 3 other coahces) and I spent 7 hours putting line ups together this weekend...we did a lot more talking that we should have, but it ended up being really fun! Any way, we WON!! The final score was 368 to 290, which is awesome! We had about 1/2 of the DQ's that we had at last years first meet, and twice as many best times!! I am so proud of my swimmers and all the effort they put into the meet last night!

We have another meet tomorrow, which again, I am a little scared about. We have some very fast swimmers, but they have even faster swimmers. But, who knows, fingers crossed I will be surprised at the end of the meet again!?