Someday, I'll learn the lessons before I need them.

The Thursday Thirteen
Things I've learned this week:

1. Always, always, always bring an extra memory card.
2. One should avoid navigating the streets of Springfield, Oregon alone...at night.
3. Stink bugs do in fact stink.
4. If you ask the balloon man at The Spaghetti Factory if he can craft you a narwhal balloon animal, he can...and will.
5. Macklemore makes for excellent running music.
6. iPhones have lifesaving features. Especially for those who lack adequate navigational skills.
7. How I Met Your Mother possesses extremely tasteful comedic qualities and thus is highly addicting.
8. If you politely ask {yell at} your upstairs neighbors to turn down their television, they will do so in a surprisingly timely manner.
9. It takes my roommates and me less than 24 hours to completely devour a box of Betty Crocker brownies.
10. My black boots have NO traction.
11. If I buy chocolate chips for baking, chances are they will get devoured before they actually become a part of any concoction. 
12. My usual running route doubles as a hot spot for a local elementary school's wildlife-study field trips. {Little. Kids. Everywhere.}
13. I have amazing parents {and grandparents} for too many reasons to list.

Someday, my prince will come.

Okay, so I love this video for two reasons:

1. Because I'm girl, so naturally I'm a sucker for sappy love stuff.

2. The makers of this video knew what they were doing. Amazingly powerful.

Patrick and Kimberly (The Proposal) from Shutter Life Productions on Vimeo.

Someday, Mr. Owl will make it past three.

For those of you who remember this one...

Warmer...

Still a little left...

SO. CLOSE.

Dang it.

How many licks does it take to get to the tootsie roll center of a tootsie pop?

"The world may never know."

Someday, I won't walk 3 flights to do laundry.

Apartment living. Do I love it...or do I hate it.
Jury's still out.


Things I loathe:

1. My old bent key that picks a fight with the lock EVERY time I try to enter our humble dwelling.
2. The upstairs neighbors that disregard the fact that they have laminate flooring and seem to have mistaken their apartment for a basketball-court-fight-club-ring-ninja-dance-club-concert-hall-bowling-alley. They're loud.
3. The fact that maintenance can enter any time that suits them--even when you are in the shower and yell, "One moment, please!" as you hear them entering to fix your light that keeps going out & your bolt lock that fails to function.
4. My light that keeps going out & my bolt lock that fails to function.
5. The. Really. Slow. Internet. (I just want to get through one episode of Grey's Anatomy without it freezing...does McSteamy live? I guess I'll never know.)
6. Buying your own groceries = $KA-CHING$. On the verge of becoming an extreme coupon-er.
7. I have yet to meet my neighbors. I miss the dorm's sense of community. I did however, meet one neighbor across the hall--of course I was out of breath and sweaty as it was upon my return from a run. 
8. The classy cigarette burns in our coffee table and the lovely dragon chalk mural adorning our patio--courtesy of the past residents.
9. The sink faucet that doesn't fully turn off unless you jam the handle back in place.

Things I love:

1. My amazing roommates. Seriously, they're pretty bomb. Sore abs from laughing = success. (I think this point alone can outweigh all the negative ones.)
2. DECOR EVERYWHERE. Thanks, Pinterest.
3. No need for shower shoes.
4. My very own pantry. 
5. The seven minute walk to Starbucks. 
6. Buying your own groceries = Baked. Beans. For. Days.
7. The couch. I would have killed for one of those bad boys in my dorm room--not that it would have even slightly fit.
8. Sitting on our patio watching the sunset. 
9. Someone is always baking. Macaroons. Cupcakes. Brownies. Banana Bread. Rainbow cake. Zucchini bread. Cinnamon Rolls. (Although still undecided on the how good/bad this really is.)
10. Being able to say, "why don't you come over to my place?"

Oh okay. I can't deny it. I love apartment #234. Loud ninja neighbors and all.

Someday, I'll be a good bowler.

Just needed to express {complain} publicly that the gene for bowling technique skipped a generation--my generation. I'm lucky if I break 100. With bumpers.

It's bad.

Points for style?

Someday, they'll shed their mythical implication.

When they come up in conversation--which is quite often--people often ask me if narwhals are real animals.

My response:

*laugh*

*realize they're serious*

*want to cry*

Yes, narwhals are real. Please stop stupidly inquiring about the existence of a clearly tangible arctic dweller.

That is all.

Someday, they'll go to Texas.

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Overalls from this post, now have a new destination. So proud of my girl, Bonich Meister! Living her dream and going to TCU {Texas Christian University} now calls for our overalls to venture to Texas! Missing my sisters already as many of them are beginning to depart for another long school year away from our hometown of Wilsonville but thanks to these beauties, love is just an ugly XXXL Winnie the Pooh embroidered denim jumpsuit away.

Traditional photo for J & B...

Someday, I'll remember to pack my toothbrush.

It's the one thing I ALWAYS forget to pack. Just ask Natalie...in grade school, I just kept an extra at her house for sleepover purposes. Well a weekend trip to Sunriver, OR proved nothing had changed as I neglected to pack any agent of oral hygiene. It's okay. One gas station was fully stocked.

The trip was nothing short of entertaining. Between learning and rapping {almost} all the words to Hoodie Allen's "No Interruption," taking an accidental 13-mile hike {in full-on Bear Grylls mode}, getting eaten alive by bloodthirsty mosquitos, associating with tipsy Bend Brewfest goers, attending an  {to avoid the risk of sounding insulting} "alternative" music performance--we were only interested in the opening act--and many other accounts that delivered gut-busting laughter...I'd say it was a successful  trip.

So glad I could spend the weekend feasting my eyes on beautiful central Oregon.

*Oh and one final note: to the guys floating the river, awkwardly paddling over and asking if our inter tube device is actually a kiddy pool will not prove as a successful method of flirtation, nor will gushing about the flip flop you lost yesterday.
~That is all.~

"I be working like I'm Anders Holmvik."

Someday, it'll all make sense.

After slipping into a pretty regular running schedule over the last few months, I've experienced a lot of frustration as a recent back injury slowed me down and regressed my progress. I would go half my usual distance before a sharp pulsing pain cut into my spine. I gave it a few days and though the pain had eased, it was still present and the regression it has caused was highly un-motivating. I cursed this pain and wondered why things that hinder the plans we make for ourselves find it okay to make themselves so comfortable in our lives. It wasn't until a few days ago that I realized running more upright caused the pain to vanish. The annoying back pain that I cursed actually began to act as a cue that I wasn't running with good posture. So as this back pain acted as negative reinforcement and corrected my form, I noticed that running essentially became easier.

This principle, I've noticed, has become increasingly applicable to many aspects of my life. I make plans for the future--I think I know what I want and what will be best. God seems to have a funny way of putting roadblocks in the way of those plans that we often fight and question. However, if we can muster up the patience, we are blessed with experiences that unveil an ultimately positive reason for our struggles.


Cause the pain that you've been feeling
It's just the dark before the morning.
{Appropriate lyrics from Josh Wilson's song, "Before the Morning"}

Someday, I'll be graceful {part 3}.

First of all, the prodigal blogger returns! Summer hasn't exactly made me lazy, it's just changed my priorities I guess. Dog sitting, nannying, starting a new job, and breathing have kind of trumped blogging but I'm determined to get back at it...

In other news...yes, I have the ability to compose a third post on the subject of the clumsy accounts of Brittany Alexandra Hallin. This one's a doozy. It all started with an unfortunate spillage of au jus back in the kitchen of my workplace where I waitress. Upon getting slammed with more tables than my rookie, unexperienced waitress abilities could handle, fate graced me with an unfortunate step in this greasy puddle.

Well one thing led to another and before I knew it I was bum down and feet up with broken glass in my leg and a bruise on my tailbone. I am not sure what hurt more...my pride or my back. Well now, I'd say it's my back.

Someday, we'll take the advice we're given.

A wise man {AKA this really cool friend I have} once said, "a person doesn't know what he or she wants until he or she is twenty-three--with few exceptions." These words consoled me for I still have no idea what in the world I want out of this life. I am only eighteen, but at the pace life seems to be accelerating at, I am at times afraid to blink because I fear I'll miss something.
And I have goals. Big goals. Little goals. Medium sized goals. I have LOTS of goals. But goals are just specific aims and desires--do they really define what one wants out of life? Okay, well before I go all deep and philosophical on you, I'll stop there and try to get back to living my life, I guess... Because this friend also told me to be patient and not stress about the future, for it seems that it's when we stop looking for the things we want out of life, they tend to seek us out on their own.

Funny thing too, about advice...why does it seem that we only acknowledge the advice we're given until after we should have applied it?

Someday, I'll be graceful. {part 2}

For those of you familiar with my ongoing disagreement with gravity, inability to consume food without choking, and innate urge to make abnormal faces upon greeting people, you will not be surprised that this week fails to disappoint when it comes to not-so-graceful mishaps...

So let's see...

1. Upon handing my salad ticket to the cashier at Dux Bistro {on-campus dining location} I managed to clumsily empty the entire contents of my salad bowl onto the counter. Not to place blame, {eh-hem cashier *cough* *cough* may have nudged my salad causing the leafy greens to plummet out of my grasp *cough* cough*} I do not find the fault to be my own, however it most definitely appeared to be as such. Between the deer-in-the-headlights expression of the cashier along with a peeved group of students building up behind me in line, I swiftly scooped the contents of my now "extra tossed," "counter-seasoned" dinner back into my bowl. Yum.

2. I'll spare the details of this next one because I think I've over-shared my bloody-knee firefighter story with anyone who will listen--granted it was hilarious & oh so unusal--but anyway it was another disagreement with gravity that left me in a frazzled, wounded state only to be doted on by a {medically certified ;)} firefighter.

3. On a run, I spotted a friend. Naturally, I sprinted over in her direction yelling her name. I'm not sure if it was the confused expression or her hysterically laughing friend that led me to believe it was NOT who I thought it was. Need to remember to wear my contacts...I just may be getting a reputation as "that girl who randomly waves and people and calls them by random names." Sweet.

Well I guess that's only three offenses this week--but then again, the week's not over. And those first two were kind of doozies...

Goal for this summer: develop some sort of defense against nature's unexplainable desire to brand me as a klutz.

Someday, they'll actually travel.

Sisterhood of the traveling pants overalls.

Yes, that's two girls.
In one pair of
overalls.

Summer 2011: A spontaneous trip to the Wilsonville Goodwill with some friends, along with some good old fashioned fate, led to the discovery of these beauties. Inspired by the film & book Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants {see below trailer if unfamiliar with the concept}, we decided this denim creation would keep us united as well all departed in the fall for our freshman years of college. 

A set of rules {I cannot share because of the sworn secrecy of the sisterhood} were set forth, a journal to log our college experiences and share amongst one another was composed, and the sisterhood was born.

These classy, {Whinny the Pooh} embroidered trousers ended up only making a total of ONE round trip--but hey, that's six sisters & five schools across three states! 

So maybe the overalls didn't fit us all...but they did fit all of us inside of them at once.

Gret, Cat, Bo, Jess, & Nat {however, I do see you everyday}, I'll see ya'll in less than a week!

Someday, I'll reside seaside.

Something about the ocean is so alluring. Anyone who's every been to any coastal town {notice usage of word "coastal" not "beach"--we live in Oregon...not Cali} can identify that calm aura that seems to settle in along with the sea's mist. Hustling and bustling fail to disturb this signature tranquility of the Oregon coast. I've always thought that at some point in my life, it'd be nice to call a beach or coast home--even if it's not until retirement {yes, I'm thinking that far ahead}.

 Memorial day weekend getaway to Newport with some good ol' friends.

I'd say we came home with some priceless memories.

jetty~rooftops~clamming~taffy~cranky neighbors~spaghetti~"yolo"

Someday, I'll take notes.

But I guess I'm a just a doodler at heart! You can thank the monotone nature of professors and the luxury of having lecture notes posted on blackboard for these random little scribbles...

Someday, I'll get contacts.

And hallelujah they're in the mail!

It's getting bad.

As I type this I am awkwardly keeping to myself as I just flamboyantly waved at a girl who entered the room because I thought she was an acquaintance. Needless to say, she looked at me in utter confusion--as she should have--I do NOT know her {as I discovered a little too late}.

Sadly, this occurrence is not one of unique nature--it has started to occur daily. That's just too much embarrassment for one girl to take. The worst occasion yet was when I actually greeted someone by their dopple-ganger's name. Awkward. Really though, how are you supposed to respond to that?

So...
Next time you pass me on the street {whether or not you REALLY know me} & if you even remotely resemble someone I know, chances are you will get a friendly greeting from yours truly.

Someday, they'll call me Aaron Lee Ralston.

But probably not.

I did get rock wall certified though - it was on the U of O "Duck-it List." 

Rock on! {I crack myself up.}

Just some highly extensive notes I took on standard
rock climbing procedures. So studious, I know.

That's right, I am now deemed sufficiently knowledgeable in the art of climbing to use the University of Oregon recreational center rock wall. And I make a pretty mean figure-eight knot. Just saying.

So you just wait. In a few weeks, this will be me...minus the falling bit.

P.S. - See this movie! {127 Hours} Pretty epic. AND it stars James Franco. What's not to like ;)...

Someday, time won't go by so fast.

Dear life,

Slow down.

Sincerely,
18-almost-19-year-old who still feels like she's in 5th grade.

Someday, I'll be a narwhal.

Narwhals. Unicorns of the sea. 

~

I don't know if it was the famous line from Elf, a marine bio project from high school, or simply their truly majestic nature that did me in.

But I do know this: 

Narwhals are cool. I want one.
{Pillow Pet form acceptable.}

LOOK WHAT I FOUND TODAY!

"Bye, Buddy. Hope you find your dad."

Someday, we'll be ol' geezers.

Wishing a happy happy 19th birthday to this hottie biscotti!

Astounded by the fact that I've been blessed enough to help my best friend sister, Nattle {as I call her} conquer nine of her nineteen years! This witty, spunky, lively, giggly, smart, genuine girl is all I could ask for when it comes to a best friend. Between constant bickering, {many high school teachers compared us to an old married couple} the tears we've shared over dramatic episodes of Grey's Anatomy, and an abounding amount of memories, I'd say I've hit the jackpot when it comes to best friends.

Happy birthday, Nattle! Enjoy your LAST year of being a teen. Get ready to live it up. ;)

What would a birthday post be without our theme song?!

Someday, we'll do our homework.

Me: Let's go do homework outside!

Sarah: Okay!

~

*Go outside.*

*Sit down.*

*Open books.*

*Stare at a page for two seconds.*

*Close books.*

*Tan & make flower chains instead.*

If only every weekend was like this...

{But next time with sunscreen!}

Someday, I'll be graceful. {Part 1}

{Part 1 because I'm sure there will be posts of similar nature to follow...}

So far, this month has been record breaking when it comes to embarrassing moments.

1. Tipped a desk over in class. A very silent class.
2. Unknowingly walked into a construction site {and almost got taken out by a digger} while trying to avoid walking through a U of O tour group assemblage.
3. Tripped on well...a twig.
4. Voice cracked saying, "Here!" during attendance. {Apparently, I'm a pubescent boy.}
5. Almost died choking on a piece of chicken at lunch.
6. Stumbled into a fire pit. {Bruises & cuts to prove it.}

It's been a good week. Sure there are mores stories to follow. Stay tuned.

Someday, I'll hike Spencer's Butte!

It's on my U of O "Duck-It List." Among many other things, hiking Spencer's Butte has made the list of things to do during my time here at the University of Oregon. Now that Eugene has been graced by the lovely, yet ever-unpredictable, Spring weather, I couldn't ask for a more optimal time to go on this adventure...still slightly ashamed I haven't yet...

Someday, I'll have self control.

 Easter candy + End of Lent {AKA deprivation} + Grandma's cookies {now gone} = one aching tum tum.
Needless to say, I got sooooo fed up with my lack of self control that I {aggressively} packaged all of the goodies into a big zip lock bag and tossed that sucker right in the freezer. TAKE THAT, CHOCOLATE! I WIN.


Not too much later...


Hmmmm...wonder how long it will take this chocolate bunny to thaw...

Someday, I'll find my Jack Dawson...

...but he won't end up at the bottom of the Atlantic. I'll make sure I share the floating door. {Why so selfish, Kate Winselt? Like, really?!}

Anyway...
I know I already posted on the return of Titanic to the big screen but that was BEFORE I actually experienced it. The event of going to see the film in theaters deserved its very own, exclusive post. So here it goes...

Saturday. A beautiful, Spring Saturday. The anticipation that flooded my very veins was unspeakably overwhelming...{and yes, Bonich & Jess, of course I'm referring to how excited I was to reunite with your two lovely faces!} Okay, so of course some of my excitement was rooted in the fact that I would soon be immersed in the classic yet tragic love story of Jack and Rose. But first, some much needed catch up time with some ol' friends over a traditional Macaroni Grill create-your-own-pasta dish. {Yum.} The lovely Bonich Meister accompanied me after dinner to experience the resurrection of James Cameron's masterpiece. The experience was no less than epic. The old lady next to us {who was probably dehydrated by the end of the movie because she was balling her eyes out the whole time}, looking around seeing those ugly, boxy glasses on every viewer {seriously, who freaking designed these atrocities?!}, and of course the epic film itself all made for a nothing-less-than-perfect cinematic experience.

Favorite part of the movie? Well, the "I'm flying, Jack!"scene never fails to deliver goosebumps. However, the part that really gets me is when Rose is sitting in the descending lifeboat, staring longingly into Jack's eyes  while he is restrained on the {SPOILER ALERT} sinking ship. After some dramatic music and some drawn-out exchange of hopeless expressions, Rose's combination of love and grief overwhelms her causing her to leap back onto the doomed Titanic into Jack's embrace. True love at its finest? Yep. Too bad it's short lived. Which brings us back to my biggest issue with the film: why couldn't she share the flipping door?

Would I go again? Pssshhhh...please. Need you ask?
Any takers?

Oh, & be sure to check out this Ellen spoof. That woman is hilarious. 

Courtesy of Bonich Meister

"Are you doing yours in 3D?"

Someday, I'll marry Steve Moakler.

A few months ago, I picked up some of Steve Moakler's lovely tunes on NoiseTrade & have been hooked ever since. He ain't too bad to look at either ;).

{some faves of the moment}

Someday, there'll be palm trees.

My lovely cousin, Grace :), asked me to venture down to sunny Palm Springs with her last week...tooooooo bad I had finals confining me to the snow-covered U of O campus. So while Grace basked in the glorious rays of California and became a tan goddess, I bundled up and braced the chill of Sun River with the fam {still a mighty dandy time, I must say}. 

Still determined to cross the Oregon/Cali border & see a palm tree this year.

{ice skating~mt bachelor~cozy reading nooks~goody's hot cocoa}