Although you might think cutting 13 inches of hair off of my head was a spur-of-the-moment-type decision - it wasn't. I've been thinking about it for a month at least. I even uploaded my cute little head to a cute little virtual haircutting website and wasted a good half-hour trying out different virtual hairstyles on my virtual self. 

^^BAHAHA. All of these hairstyles should be fully recognizable from famous celebs. Do you recognize hair from the likes of Miley Cyrus, Anne Hathaway, and Nicki Manaj?? If not, I suggest you do a little more studying up on the current VIPs of today's media world.

Although the website was not nearly as helpful as I hoped, I knew I needed a change. And it needed to be big. I talked to a girl in my ward who is a hair stylist and I set up an appointment to go to her salon to get it cut. Even after I set up the appointment, I still wasn't sure what I wanted to do. 

I thought about that appointment 10+ times daily, and the conclusion I came to was this: If I cut my hair short, and I hate it, and I want to cry, and I'm mad at myself for cutting it...I would at least feel better knowing my hair was going to good cause. 

At 7:25 am on Friday, I left for the extremely classy establishment, Vavesque Hair Salon, in Lehi. I felt it completely appropriate that the song, "Brave" by Sarah Bareilles played TWICE on the radio on the way there. I turned it up all the way and sang along to all of the lyrics that I knew (which really weren't all that many...).

Also, did I mention how Stephen was out of town during all of this? HAHA. Being the nice wife that I am, I DID tell him that I was going to cut my hair and that it was going to be drastic, but he said he didn't want to see any pictures, he'd rather just wait until he got home. Being the mean wife that I am I sent him the completely-terrifying picture of my "hair ferrets" sitting on my lap. HAHA. He came home last night and neither of us have shed any tears yet so I'd say that's a good sign. ;) 

I was all excited to post about the halloween decorations I put up in my classroom today when I realized...I never even posted pictures of my classroom once I finally finished it!!!!! How the worst am I?! I guess that gives an idea of just how CRAAAAZY the last FIFTY-EIGHT days have been since school started! (Also. WHHHHHAT?! 58 days??!?!) Next week marks the end of the first term which marks 1/4 of the way through the school year. WHAT. I can't even believe how fast it's flown. Oh, and in case I haven't mentioned this yet - TEACHING IS SO MUCH FUN. The planning is pretty awful and during the first few weeks I had maybe-a-few breakdowns after spending 15ish hours planning for the week - but now I'm in the routine of things and basically it's just like a party all day everyday with hilarious and energetic 11-12 year olds. (Who are the perfect captive audience for all of my ridiculous anecdotes and horrible knock-knock jokes. Plus, they have to boost my ego otherwise I take away tickets. hehe. 

...and you probably think I'm joking.... ;))

ANYWAY. Back to the good stuff: IT'S YOUR LUCKY DAY(s) because today started FALL BREAK which means I will be able to delight you all with ALL OF THE BLOG POSTS (or at least the ones I have neglected for the past 58 days).

 (For those of you not familiar with the blessed, blessed thing known as Fall Break, it's two days off from school for no other reason other than the wonderful fact that it is fall and the leaves are turning beautiful fall colors and the morning air is extra crisp. BTW, it is magical.)

Without further adeu: My classroom. (Or at least what it looked like a few months ago...the desks have been rearranged at least two times since these pictures were taken.)

So there you have it! Unlike the little baby flags... the other banner(s) took a stupid amount of time. ha. They did turn out basically how I pictured (which is a shock all on its own)....but the amount of time they took?!?!! I'm not sure they were worth it....

I don't know what it is about Provo and its incessant need to break world records, but it all started spring of my freshman year when the city broke the record of the World's Largest Water-Balloon Fight. A few years later, someone came up with the bright idea to host the "World's Largest Dodgeball tournament," which not only broke a world record, but also broke a few people's arms and legs as I recall. (Possibly due to the fact that the teams were BYU vs. U of U and it was rivalry week.) This year's record-breaking target was the world's largest scavenger hunt called #passporttoprovo, and for the first time, Stephen and I were able to participate! Tasks included things like picking up trash, taking a selfie with a llama, playing with a puppy, reading an excerpt from a children's book, finding the "Provo Sasquatch," and (our favorite) sampling sweet potato fries from Gurus! Although our team (The Foliage Eaters ®) ended up kind of falling apart just before the event, Stephen, Danielle (aka T-Bone), and I had a ton of fun!

The previous record for the largest scavenger hunt was 900-something participants and this one ended up having 2,079! There were different categories and each team had to complete at least three tasks in each of the categories in order to count for the world record. One of the tasks was going into Allen's Camera and getting your picture taken. All of the people who participated in this task then had their photo included in a photo-mosaic. Can you find us?!?!?

(...don't ask me why Stephen is making that weird face ;))

Here's to making history! (at least until the next bunch of people with too much time on their hands break the record again....)

As embarrassing as this might be to admit... I started mentally composing a "one year anniversary" post WEEKS before our one year anniversary...but unfortunately the time to write it came and went while every nook and cranny of my brain was (and is) filled with "the 6th grade thoughts" and all previously meditated drafts of this post are nowhere to be found.

However, I would STILL like to share just a few reasons why this past year (+ ~1 month) has been THE BEST YEAR OF MY LIFE -- all thanks to that guy who I met one fateful morning five (!!!) years ago.

Here are some of my favorite memories from this past year: (SIDE NOTE: Some/many of these will probably be "you had to be there" moments I am posting more for our future benefit than anyone else's. Feel free to read about them, but by no means feel obligated to think they are as funny as we do ;))

+ One day I was talking to Stephen about macaroons. I asked him if he'd ever had one and I showed him this picture because he wasn't sure what I was talking about. He glanced at the picture and exclaimed, "Those look like tiny hamburgers!" 

+One night we were laughing so hard and we couldn't fall asleep. Finally I said, "We REALLY need to go to sleep!" After a few minutes I said, "Are you sleepy?" and Stephen said faintly, "nooo...buut if I talk in my sleeeeepy voice I miiiight be able to convince myself that I'm sleeeeepy...." 

+I honestly can't remember how it started, but at some point I started saying, "I love yo' mind and yo' body and yo' souuul." Now Stephen says it too and I think it's hilarious.

+When we ate dinner at the Cheesecake Factory the waiter came over THREE different times to ask if we had chosen what cheesecake we wanted for dessert. After he left each time we would start talking and forget we were supposed to be choosing a cheesecake. I loved that we would rather continue our conversation than choose (and consequently EAT) cheesecake. ;) (But don't worry, we eventually decided on a cheesecake, and eat cheesecake we DID!)

+One day I was scratching Stephen's head when he said, "Ya...I'll DEFINITELY pay our future children to do this." (This is particularly funny if you realize that my dad used to pay us kids a quarter for every hour we would scratch his head. hahhaa. I don't remember if that was exactly the ratio but it was something equally as ridiculous ;))

+Stephen and I are somewhat infamous in our family for our extremely memorable (and highly skilled ;)) renditions of Happy Birthday that we often film and send to people. Hopefully those videos are promptly deleted and not kept for future blackmail purposes...

+A few weeks after we got married, we were getting ready to go to sleep and Stephen said, "We need to say prayers." Almost instinctively we both called out, "PRAYERS!" at exactly the same time. We were laughing so hard we silently agreed to make this a tradition. We probably do this 2-3 times a week now and even though we've done it well over 100 times, we still think it's hilarious. 

+When Stephen walked into my classroom to meet my class a couple of weeks ago, all of the boys exclaimed excitedly (almost in unison), "WOAH!!! He IS buff!!!!" HAHAH. It was seriously the best. One of the students in my class asked him, "How many times a day do you work out?" (Nothin' like 6th graders to boost your ego, huh? I'm pretty sure Stephen is rethinking his career path ;)) Having Stephen in my classroom for just that couple of minutes was SO much fun. I wish he could come to school with me everyday. :)

I know there are MANY MANY more instances that illustrate how much fun we've had this past year, but I'm afraid if I try to write them all...I'll never finish this post! 

Stephen is without a doubt one of the funniest, kindest, most intelligent, patient and caring men I've ever met and I COULD NOT BE HAPPIER at the notion of spending not only "til death do we part" but wayyy after that, too! 

Here's to forever with my best friend by my side! 

I'm so glad I married happy ;)