The move

After a very long day, everything is out of the old house and into the new! Just don't go thinking that there is actually room for us to move around..case in point:

My Room

 It was adventurous trying to find clothes for work this morning. My pants were in one part of the room while my shoes and shirts were in another. It was a miracle I even knew what box to look in!

The living room

 We plan on putting our movies and games in this awesome built-in cabinet 

 The living room is about a third of the size of our last one - we could easily fit 3 couches in it - so it's quite the adjustment learning how to live in such a small area again. I didn't get a picture, but there's a huge window to the left which makes it very bright in here pretty much all day long. 

The kitchen 

 The fridge is loud, there's no dishwasher, and not a lot of room for a table, but I like it.

The incomplete half-bath

 The landlord is in the process of finishing this room. When he's done there will be a toilet to the left - it's probably easier to see where in the next picture - and the washer/dryer next to the sink.

 Oh, did I mention that the second-hand washer/dryer doesn't work just yet? That's also on the landlord's list of things to do.

The complete full bathroom

Melody's room

Beth's room

Kami's room 

 I don't know if you can really tell, but her bed is surrounded by all of her stuff, kind of like mine!

Stairs in Kami's room to the basement

 The door to the right leads to the backyard (pictures of that to come later, it was night when I snapped these). Kami doesn't have a closet, so she'll use some of the storage downstairs as hers. 

The basement (aka the library, Kami's closet, our random storage)

 Melody and I both have a LOT of books, so what we can't fit in our rooms will be put down here. 

We'll most likely be putting some of the bigger kitchen stuff that doesn't fit upstairs down here too. As you can see, we are not in need of storage space :) 

Look, Harry Potter could come live with us! :) 

This room was a big selling point for us, we LOVE storage!

I'm excited to get everything put away and organized. First on the to-do list is to finish cleaning the old house. Luckily Nilla is staying for another week in that house so we have time to do that. Next will be organizing the kitchen so we can eat, then our rooms and the living room. I'm guessing that it will take us at least a week to get it all done. Once everything is complete I plan on throwing a house-warming party to celebrate this next adventure!

I do indeed believe in miracles.

Today confirmed that yet again.

For those that aren't aware, I'm moving from my current place into a new one on Monday. It's a cute little house that I'll be sharing with 3 other girls - update with pictures to come once the dust has settled. The only downside to the whole experience has been the stress over the amount of money needed for the deposit and first month's rent. I don't make enough money to cover that amount without serious pinching and saving. So needless to say, I've been somewhat of a grouch lately as I've been stressing. I knew that everything would work out because Heavenly Father told me so, I just had no idea how it was all going to happen.

Taking the old adage to heart, I prayed as though it all depended on the Lord and went to work as though it all depended on me. I made sure to never miss a day of work, I went to Bishop and asked if I could go to the Bishop's storehouse, I had a yard sale with some friends, no fast food or entertainment that wasn't free, we stopped getting Bountiful Baskets, and many other things that helped to either make money or save it. Then at the end of every day I would get on my knees and pray to my Father that what I was doing would be enough to make this miracle happen.

Moving day is in three days, the money is due when we move in, and I got paid today - the exact amount of money that I needed to cover the deposit and first month's rent. Yes, without a single doubt, do I believe in miracles. As assuredly as I believe in a loving Heavenly Father who looks out for me and loves me far more than I can imagine.

Haircut Day!

Every few months (basically, whenever I have saved $20 to spend on myself) I go and chop off my hair. Then I let it grow out till I can't handle it anymore and the cycle begins again. This time my hair was past my shoulders before I cut it; last time it was that long, I was in high school. As usual I got a weird look from the hairdresser when I told her how short I wanted it, but I'm use to people not understanding my decisions :) She chopped it all off, and I do believe I quite like it. What do you think?

Utah Summer Games

I have been volunteering at the Utah Summer Games the past few days because of Kami. She had signed up to keep score and do the books for the basketball games, but there weren't enough volunteers to cover all the games so I got dragged along to help out. It was a lot of fun! More fun than I thought it would be - especially considering that I don't really like basketball that much. I've decided that basketball goes on the list of sports that I only enjoy watching live (joining baseball, soccer, pretty much any sport really....except football, that I'll watch on tv).

Watching the men's games definitely was the best part. There are some hot men that play basketball and they play it well. Kami and I had fun staring at the cute players. It got a little distracting though, I forgot to start the clock a few times cuz I was more focused on the player instead of the game. But since I'm so cute they forgave me :) One of the refs took it upon himself to find me a husband. Too bad the first three guys he asked were either too young or married. It did make me feel better that the ref, Phil, thought I was 20 which explains why he tried to set me up with the 18 year old. The best part of that night was when I completely embarrassed myself, without any help from Phil.

At one of the games there were no fans at all - just the teams, refs, and us - so it was pretty quiet. Since there were no fans we decided to that we had to cheer and make it a fun game for the teams. As we were discussing which team to cheer for, the realization came to me that #24 on the white team was cute! Unfortunately, I decided to relate that realization during a foul shot, in a louder-than-I-thought voice, so everyone heard it. I just slapped my hand across my mouth saying "crap, that was loud". Phil turned around and gave me the biggest smile that said "yep that was loud, but awesome". Luckily #24 took it well and just smiled throughout the game every time he looked our way.

The overall best part of the weekend happened today. Kami, Amy, and I were at the scoreboard table waiting to get the team's rosters when I hear from both Kami and Amy "Hey, that's Randy!" I looked up and indeed it was Randy from Kid History. (If you haven't seen any Kid History episodes go here NOW! and watch all 5 episodes. It won't disappoint, I promise.) That's when I realized that the guy writing down the roster was also from Kid History - he just has a smaller part, he had to give up his moneys. So we got to meet celebrities and watch them play basketball! Mark, the guy who wrote down the team's roster, was really nice and had fun talking to us before the game started.

We had to delay the game by a few minutes cuz one of the coaches missed the Cedar exit. A few guys came over to talk to us when I kept changing the time for when the game starts. They teased us telling us that we should be the officials and talked to us till it was time to start. It was one of those same guys who came to tell us good job at the end of the game, he also happened to be shirtless at that time..he totally planned it that way too. I saw him take his shirt off, wait about two seconds, then come to shake everyone's hand to say thanks. It made me smile, not just because he was cute, but also cuz he actually made the effort to try to impress us.

Sadly, Randy only talked to us when he came to tell us good job at the end of the game. But we had a lot of fun watching him play and trying so hard to not quote Kid History so as to not be distracted - I totally failed at that one, bytheway. Kami overheard the family of Randy's team talking during the game saying that they should try to bribe one of us by offering us Randy's autograph. She also caught Randy's mom giving him a face that said "she's cute, you should talk to her" but we don't know which one of us that look was about.

It was pretty much an epic day and weekend. I totally enjoyed it and I'm excited to see what else this crazy summer has in store for me!

Days 13 - 14

Yesterday I totally forgot to go see the kids until it was almost their bedtime. I figured that it would be better to not go over cuz I tend to make them hyper for the first half hour or so after I show up, so I didn't see them. It was a busy Sunday. Jake, Sean, and Craig came over to make some yummy treats for Shawesome's birthday party. They ended up staying at our house for 3 hours having fun. Then we headed over to the party.

Today the kids and I went for a walk that ended at my house. Nilla and Kami had fun playing with the kids. Most of my roommates had expressed how much they wanted to see the kids again before they leave, so I figured it would be ok to offer to let them sleep at my house tomorrow night - don't worry the roommies have all said it would be sweet :)

Coloring time with Nilla!

Popsicles with Aunt Katie - it's a tradition :)

Special Olympics end - Day 12 of kiddos

How to describe the way I am feeling....I know! I'm tired, sore, sunburned, exhausted, and happy! In comparison to the other days, the last day of the Special Olympics was pretty much amazing. There were many, many pros to the day and almost no cons.

This morning was the easiest beginning of all the days. We didn't have to worry about anyone not getting picked up because the drivers had to get the correct luggage packed, so they were going to all the hotels anyways. Not only was the morning easy, all day was easy. The drivers didn't need any real supervision from us. So instead of stressing over buses, Melody and I decided to entertain ourselves in other ways.

One of those ways was to play with Melody's hacky sack. Since we aren't talented enough to use our feet, we made up our own game - we call it hand hacky sack. It's the same game you just use your hands instead of your feet. We had a lot of fun playing that game. But I have to say my favorite part was that Nathan - one of the SUU co-directors for the games - and I had a lot of fun flirting over the radio as the hand hacky sack game was developed and played. I don't remember how the flirting started, but it was lots of fun and lasted for a while (I'd totally go out with him if he asked). Nathan wasn't the only one I flirted with today either. One of the bus drivers and I had fun talking today during his off time. Sadly I only got to see a glimpse of the cute BYU coach or I'd have tried flirting with him too (have I ever mentioned that I'm kind of a flirt when there's cute men around? Cuz I am).

We didn't have very many volunteers today - the least we've had all 3 days - so Melody and I helped out at Olympic Town every now and then. It was a nice break from the hot, hot sun. While we were helping out Cindy and the kids showed up!

I often thought that the kids were only happy to see me because they got cotton candy..

I love how Jason sticks his face in the cotton candy

Emily preferred snow cones over cotton candy

Finally, the kid will eat an apple! We've been trying for a week to get her to eat one. I should have know that I just had to tell her that it was MY apple and she'd eat it..

Just as Cindy and the kids showed up, so did a special guest....DARTH VADAR!!

They were mobbed as soon as people saw them. We had to have body guards around them when they were walking over because the athletes would just swarm them and block traffic. Shelly really wanted to meet one so I took her over there to meet a Storm Trooper. Except that she was so scared of him that she wouldn't even wave or give him a high five. To get her to not be scared anymore, the Storm Trooper took his helmet off so Shelly could see that he wasn't really all that scary. He was really nice and let her wear the helmet to see what it was like.

Shelly the Storm Trooper!

She warmed up to him in the end

She ran back to Cindy afterwards and told her all about her new friend

Some of the Games Organizational Committee

(left to right: Storm Trooper, Taylor [I think], Kaite B, Chewy, Me, Jose, Nathan [yes he's the one of the above mentioned flirting])

Olympic Town had a bean bag toss game. The kids had fun playing around there. Jason made some new friends while playing with the bean bags. The athlete would throw the bag, Jason would go pick it up, and bring it back to him to throw again. It was too cute!

At the end of the day Melody and I were trying to get our buses out of town so that we could be done! Every time one of them left we would jump on the radio and celebrate. When it came time to turn our radios in, Melody and I had the following conversation:

Me: Hey my friend, Melody!

Melody: Yes my friend Katie?

Me: Guess what! We are officially DONE!!!!!

Melody: (half through the radio, half heard from far away) YESSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!

Rochelle: Hey my amazing transportation girls

Us: Yes?

Rochelle: Are you officially done?

Us: YESS!!!!

-We were only a little excited :) -

Rochelle and Bobbyjo (the SLC directors and the big bosses of the whole games) had nothing but praise for us. Rochelle specifically asked me if I was coming back next year and if I enjoyed doing transportation enough to do it again (Yes and yes, Rochelle). Both Rochelle and Bobbyjo were amazed at how well we were able to come together as a committee in such a short amount of time. They are very excited to come back to SUU next year for the games and want all of us to come back as well. I'm all in!!

Special Olympics the Second

Today was very boring compared to yesterday. It started and ended a little crazy, though. I texted all our bus drivers at 7:30 to make sure that they were up and getting their people at the hotels to the different venues. We had to make sure that that someone stopped at every hotel - we have 5 drivers and 10 hotels - so that we didn't repeat yesterday and forget someone. After the buses each made 2-3 trips, we sent all but 2 away.

During the day, we just had 2 buses making a loop between the two different venues. Our job mostly consisted of answering any questions the bus drivers (or passengers) had, sitting around making sure the buses showed up at regular intervals, and joking around on the radio - that one sentence basically describes 10 hours of my day.

The busiest time was at the end of the night. Melody and I had to figure out not only where the buses were going tonight, but how we were going to get everyone's luggage to the right bus tomorrow morning. Luckily we have great drivers who are willing to go around to multiple hotels in the morning and pick up those people who are leaving Cedar on their bus. Hopefully tomorrow morning won't be too hectic for us..

Ups and Downs of today:

-I officially look like a lobster

-Cindy brought Shelly, Jason, and Emily to come visit me!

-Nilla brought COLD water and umbrellas to shade ourselves with

-Rochelle (our boss) loves us

-Found out that playing card games in the hot sun with no shade is only fun for about 20 minutes

-One of the BYU coaches is totally cute!

-Didn't get yelled at today

-The cute coach complemented us on our smooth running of the bus shuttling

-We actually got to EAT!

-Sitting out in 70 degree weather without shade for 10 hours makes me tired, grumpy, and very, very sarcastic on the radio (turns out most of people think I'm funny when I'm that sarcastic)