In The Spirit of Thanksgiving...

In the spirit of Thanksgiving...here are just a few things I'm most thankful for...









(Okay, I just don't understand the one on the bottom, left. It makes me smile, and I would love to see someone try to walk in it...)




Oh, does that seem superficial? Nuts, let me try this again and see if I can dig a little deeper.... ;)

...For the Restored Gospel on the Earth and my many blessings because of it.



...To have a testimony of the Gospel and to have the opportunity to testify of its truthfulness through word, action, and song.



...For an awesome, loving family...my best friends.



...For amazing friends and influences...









...For God's Masterpieces to bring us some joy...








...For the ability to laugh often...



...For His always being willing to carry me when I don't have the strength to do it alone.



...For talents to work on and a purpose to go along with them.


...For the chance to learn about the world around me through schooling, books, and once-in-a-lifetime chances...












Wow, there are WAY too many to mention, but these are just a very few of the things I am most grateful for. :)

FRANCE!!

In front of the Eiffel Tower with Manda!



Um HELLO! I'm at the top of it!


Inside the Paris Opera House, inspiration of the "Phantom of the Opera".



Notre Dame!


The Louvre, home of the famous "Mona Lisa".


And here she is!



There is a whole section of the Louvre dedicated to Napolean Bonaparte's stuff. This is one of his primping mirrors. (I believe Napolean lived there for a while, but I could be mistaken.)



Many of you will recognize this from the controversial "The Da Vinci Code".



I hope this one doesn't need a subtitle.



Photo I took from the Sacre-Coeur (I don't remember how to spell Coeur, grrr.)





Well, I've pretty much given up hope of ever telling you about every place in Europe we visited back in June. Therefore, I'm now just skipping around to tell you (and show you) a little of my favorite places...so of course I'll be telling you about France.
France was the second to last place we visited on our European Capitals Tour. In some ways, it was completely what I expected, and in others, not at all, not at all. On our way through to Paris, we stopped in a little old town called Beaune. Cute little sweet French town, right? Wrong. Well, it was cute and small, but the people were anything but sweet. It seemed those Frenchies wanted to reach out and slap us "people from the states" everywhere we walked. We went to a little road-side cafe, and the French woman kept rolling her eyes at us and refused to help one of the girls in our group. She was nice to me (well, and by that I mean "tolerable") because I could speak a little French, but still, she was insane. We ran into quite a few people who were just unkind in every sense of the word, because we were not French, and not only that...we were Americans, and not French. (Honestly, the French people must be way jealous of all the Americans have, and that's the truth).
We found the Parisians to be more obliging, and after all, that makes sense since we keep their economy from going under with all our tourism. Paris was incredibly busy, but still, I loved it. It was just like I pictured. The language is absolutely beautiful, the architecture of the buildings and the set-up of the apartments along the streets are interesting. There are a lot of round-abouts there, and stemming off from the round-abouts, there there are roads going out every few feet, lined with apartments, like a wheel (round-about) with spokes (the roads). And then, of course, there was the Louvre, the Notre Dame Cathedral, the Paris Opera House (inspiration for "The Phantom of the Opera"),the Sacre-Coeur, L'Arc de Triomphe, and last but certainly not least, the Eiffel Tower. We were able to go to the top of the Tour D'Eiffel, just when the sun was setting. We also met some girls from England who lived in Notting Hill! (Ever seen the movie?)
I would love to go back and stay in Paris for a while to really get a feel for it, but a few days there was better than nothing. We ate crepes from this road-side cafe (mine was chocolate and banana...kinda weird....kinda good), and french fries! ;) Okay, no, no we didn't eat french fries there, just teasin'. I should have gone to a cafe and asked for some "freedom fries", now that would have helped their view of us Yankees.
We also took a night ride down the Seine River, which runs through the heart of Paris. What beautiful lights and sights we saw. It goes right past the Eiffel Tower. A few select times during the night, the Eiffel Tower lights up and sparkles like a bunch of diamonds for about five minutes at a time. It's a total tourist gimmic, but it was seriously SO beautiful. We were a ways away, so we didn't get the best view, but seriously, it stands far above any other building in Paris and just shimmers and it's seriously awesome. My life is complete because I finally got back to the Eiffel Tower and to Paris (even if the people are less than admirable, for the most part.) Mais, c'est la vie, n'est pas?! J'adore Paris!


I took this from the top of the Eiffel Tower (The Arc of Triumph....L'Arc de Triomphe.)


Being "triumphant" and the Arc of Triumph....yes, I'm a nerd...



The sun was bright at the top of the Tower.




Just one view of many from the Eiffel Tower.

Au Revoir!!

I've Been Named! :)

My good friend Casey just got home from his mission about a month ago. It has been awesome to catch up with him. For the last few days, I've been helping his family pack, because they are getting ready to move. Yay for packing, taping, and moving boxes. Yeehaw! One thing I have learned about Casey is that his family is dabomb.com. Haha, but seriously. Both of his parents are deaf (well, his dad is partial-hearing) and they are awesome. His dad has the best sense of humor in the world. He's constantly making jokes and I just crack up whenever he's around. He probably thinks I'm insane with how much I laugh.
The other day, while I was playing Casey's piano, he and his dad were signing back and forth and when I got done, Casey said, "We've made up a sign name for you." It's the sign "Angel" with the hands going into the letter "a" at the end (which makes sense, right?) I was so excited, because in the deaf community, a hearing person generally has to be given his/her sign name by a deaf person. It's almost like an "acceptance" thing into the deaf community. So that was pretty much awesome.
Casey has been teaching me sign language (a little....I now know how to say "My name is Angela", "What is your name?", "giraffe", "elephant", "panda bear", "duck", "bird", "pizza", "hamburger", "why", "piano" and awkward", so I'm pretty much fluent! Haha.)
It is awesome to watch Casey talk with his parents. So interesting. Casey went to D.C. on an ASL (signing) mission. He already knew sign because of his parents, obviously, but he said it has improved a ton. It's amazing to see how fast they sign back and forth. Good heavens.
Oh, and the packing has been going well too. They should be all ready to move today. Last night, we all moved boxes for a few hours, then played dodgeball with nerf balls (which I absolutely CANNOT throw to save my life...I was like one of those girls who throws the ball straight at the ground...I did it twice...) and watched a movie. All in all, a fun night! Oh, and there is already snow up at Casey's house...what the heck. Ugh. Go away, you stinkin' snow.

My New Addiction!

BEFORE AND AFTER...

(Before picture...)

(After picture...) ;)

Well, I'm officially addicted to spinning. I can not deny it. I am in love. And I'm ridiculously excited at the moment, because yesterday I asked Kim (the spin instructor) how one becomes certified to be an instructor. She told me how to do it (just a one-day, all-day class, how easy is that?!) and then said "Do it, and I will hire you to teach here." Bah!! I'm seriously thinking I'm going to do it. In addition to the awesome workout, you get to dance around to the music and there are even black lights and strobe lights. Life just doesn't get any better, I'm convinced. So there ya have it, my exciting news for the day.

General Conference!

Mike and I went to General Conference today, the Saturday Morning Session. It was the first one I have ever been to, and it was AMAZING!!! Wow, conference is the bomb. The church is true and the book is blue! :) I truly "Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet to guide us in these latter days."

blah blah blah blah blahhhhhhhhh........

Well, my blog has shown me that I am officially long-winded. The end.

Amsterdam!

Whoa, I have been REALLY bad about the whole "reporting on Europe" thing....mondo bad. Let's see here, where did we go after London? Oh that's right, after a few days with the Brits, it was off to Amsterdam on an overnight ferry! The ferry in itself was quite a fun time. Some friends and I stayed up well past midnight to watch as we left the dock and sailed off towards the land of the windmills (and we were exhausted the next night, to be sure!)
I found Amsterdam to be quite a liberal, slightly intimidating place (as much of Europe is, quite honestly). A good motto for the city would be "anything goes", and perhaps it is! In addition to the Red Light District, which is a legal prostitute street where women just stand in windows like manequins, I believe drugs and the like are completely legal and popular. Yikes.
However, there were many interesting things about the city. Did you know that Amsterdam is famous for a few things in particular, namely bikes, cheese, wooden shoes, windmills, and flowers?? Well, they are! They ride their bikes everywhere. There are very few cars. Instead, hundreds of people in bikes ride by on the roads, no matter the occasion. There were many in business-suits, talking on phones. There were many holding hands while riding separate bikes down the road. There were many texting, many in skirts, and my favorite, men riding down the street with flowers from Amsterdam's famous flower market (which we went to!) :) Amsterdammers (Amsterdamians?...haha, nah, it's Amsterdammers) ride those old-fashioned bikes. You know, those ones with the basket and little horns. But don't let that fool you, they are ruthless killers on those bikes! If you hear a horn behind you, you better jump, and fast, or you will be road-kill!
In addition to experiencing the killer bikers, we were able to see a real, old-fashioned windmill, taste some gouda (yeah, I totally don't remember how to spell that, meh) and try on some wooden shoes! Apparently, Amsterdam is also well known for it's diamonds. Ooooh la la!! We went on a tour of a diamond-making factory and got to try on some suh-weet rings. There were a lot of interesting, fun things in Amsterdam.
Of course, the most interesting and captivating thing about Amsterdam for me was the Anne Frank home. What a sad life this little girl had! It was interesting to walk through her home and see where the whole story took place. The homes in Amsterdam all just line the streets, and they are more like apartments that are all linked together. It is very easy to see how the house just blended right in and no-one expected anyone to be hiding there. The houses are all very narrow and are stacked high instead of spread out. There were still some pictures from magazines that Anne had put up on her wall, and her very diary was in a glass case to look at. It was very dark and dingy in that house, as they had to put blankets up on the windows so they were not seen. All in all, it was a very touching experience and one I will not forget. It's one thing to read about people who lived a very different life than your own, but it is a completely different thing to see exactly where those things took place in their lives and to actually feel the atmosphere they lived in. It was incredible.
While in Amsterdam, I was also able to go to the Rijksmuseum, where the famous "Night Watch" painting is hung, painted by Rembrandt, and also to the Van Gogh Museum, which has hundreds of Van Gogh's originals. Sad to say, "Starry Night" had just been moved to NYC, I believe, because it was out on loan. How sad is that! These museums were fantastic, but I must admit that Van Gogh really was not up to par with the other artists and painters of his time. There were many errors, which were pointed out at his very own museum. I do believe his fame had a lot to do with his unfortunate life as much as anything. Still, to say I've seen many of his originals was awesome! (These museums were not near as good as the Louvre in Paris or the Prado in Madrid, but that will come later!)

So, as a little summary of Amsterdam, I would have to say that the most amazing thing was the history of the place and not the people, persay. However, I'd have to say that rings true for most of Europe.

PS-
I can't believe I forgot about the stroop waffles! They have these amazing mini-waffle/cookie things in Amsterdam that are TO DIE FOR! We probably kept them in business single-handedly while there. I have been told since then, that those little delights are also in the movie "The Best 2 Years". So go see what they are. :)