it's been real, 2010

2010 was the best. ever.

want proof? ok. (sorry if this is a little cryptic. but at least I included lots of never-before blogged pictures)

January 1 brought a cross-country flight for the adventure of a lifetime. It was living the life of an intern, having State of the Union viewing parties, riding the metro and crashing the sample table at Trader Joes. It was snow and photo shoots and an impromptu trip to New York. It was Congressmen visits and midnight runs to Kramers and the beginnings of the BC/DC fam and the hoedown throwdown.

 

      

February brought snow-mageddon and Valley Forge and my birthday. We looked at historically inaccurate huts and whitewashing. It was a group trip to New York where we rocked a Times Square billboard and froze in Brooklyn. It was Olympics viewing nights and crazy tour guides.

 

 

March brought springtime and tourists and happiness. It was long walks through the district, protests and getting on Fox News. It was the Supreme Court and feeling like a "local". It was Barlow fashion shows and visiting art galleries.

April was bittersweet. It brought "goodbyes" and "let's never forget this", Easter, a Canadian-themed prom and cherry blossoms. It brought getting moshed at Georgetown concerts and late nights reminiscing and writing papers and it brought home. It was taking care of my dying Grandma and learning I can do hard things. It was going back to Provo and transitioning back to a normal student.

 

May was the flava felons and frozen yogurt extravaganza. It was old friends and new friends, outdoor adventures and loving springtime. It was when I tried crafting, running, and avoiding bird poop.

 

 

June meant it was finally summer. It was Hunger Games and jeep rides and exploring new places. It was back home for real, tough but great family time and a lot of rest.

July started out saying goodbye to Grandma, which was made better with lots of family time. It was summer camp and cousin weddings and sisters in town and nights at mom's garden. It was weekend expeditions and welcoming missionaries home.

August was full of small children and weekend adventures. It was goal setting, mountain hiking and bike trips. It was back to school, back to work and moving into a new apartment. It was new roommates and the start of my senior year.

September was transitioning to a Mac, getting used to school, football and going to the fair. It was loving life and getting ready for graduation. It was the most beautiful autumn and enjoying warm days outside.

October was being festive, returning to my beloved DC to win some big PR awards. It was a parents visit for General Conference. It was balancing school and fun, old friends and new, and just being happy. It was a missionary invasion at the temple, old roommate Sundays, and walks around Provo. It was murder mysteries and costume bowling.

November was busy. It was covering election day and being in over my head, but loving politics. It was a boyfriend. It was a balancing act and late nights. It was a new state and meeting the family and long road trips. It was an abandoned airport and gaining driving confidence.

December was dominated by my capstone class, wrapping things up and feeling slightly overwhelmed. It was the end and the beginning and making plans for the future. It was Mo-Tab, Christmas festivities and a southern vacation.

 

Thanks for the emotions, excitement and thrills, 2010. It certainly was a year to remember, and a fabulous one at that. Here's to an even greater 2011.

this is the south.

I've spent the last two weeks loving South Carolina and time with the fam. 

And yeah, people here talk about gators and coons and "the war of northern aggression" and we went to a celebration of the 150th anniversary of the state's secession, but really, the South is quite lovely.

Here's the story from my phone:

 Hello, Atlantic Ocean! A beautiful beach with more starfish than I have ever seen

 Andrew got baptized! We're all so proud of him, and even though he was a little nervous, he did great!

 Newly baptized boy in his fancy clothes.

 Christmas pie contest. Our team's entry was Elegant Chocolate Raspberry Pie. We won most festive, which is quite an accomplishment, seeing as I was the only one with a 2 year old and an 8 year old on my team.

 Andrew, Natalie and Graham all became junior rangers at Fort Sumter. They were so excited to find all the facts and answer their trivia questions, then put their name on the wall of fame.

 Natalie and I dressed in traditional southern clothes, complete with hoop skirts but not the corset. I think I really could have lived in the antebellum south, you know without the war and everything.

 Rainbow Row in downtown Charleston was as lovely as I imagined. My favorite is the yellow house, which is for sale. Serendipitous?

 The architecture of downtown is just so quaint. I would love to live in any of the houses!

And just because I don't have a picture of Spence, and because he looks so cute in his new Thomas PJs.

so close...

done:
public relations capstone class, client presentation and book of death
religion final
2 hour beastly world politics final
global comms paper
elections final
apartment cleaned, bags packed, presents exchanged

to do:
visit Charleston, SC for a southern Christmas and baptism of a very special boy.
never mind I'm exhausted, got 2 hours of sleep last night and am flying through a snow storm. I'm pde (pretty darn excited)

reunited and it feels so good.

Meet the Taggarts...

Dearest Breezy and Gabel met in DC and got married a few weeks back. They are pretty, they are in love, ya ya ya. But we all know the reason of the wedding was really to have a Barlow reunion.

and reunite we did.

There's a lot of love in my heart for these people, and I loved all the laughter and memories we shared.

I was hit with a flood of nostalgia.

Judge Griffiths

The chicken incident

Barlow Court

boys matching 101

dance parties

midnight trips to Kramers

feeding the birds in Alexandria

dinner group

 Dr. G.

it was like nothing in the past 7 months had changed.

even though we are all over the place and getting ready for bigger things.

this will always be the BC/DC family.

and I love that.

Congrats Breezy and Gabel. Thanks for letting us rearrange the furniture at your reception so we could all sit together and for letting us do the Hoedown Throwdown as the other guests stared.

It's just what we do, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

things that never fail to make me happy

the gospel

movie trailers

listening to "I gotta feeling" on the way to campus and resisting the urge to flail

spending the evening cuddled up on the couch, discussing life

positive notes from the testing center screens

the family

hot chocolate with mini-marshmallows

byu basketball team intro (cougar fans--its time)

joseph dance parties

weddings

laughing children

warm socks

that feeling of climbing in to a warm bed on a cold night

good hair days

general conference

washed-up pop star's Christmas albums

and this...

turkey time.

thanksgiving 1.0: fakesgiving.
       a pre-Thanksgiving Sunday get-together with a unique assortment of friends and lots and lots of food. I broke out the homemade stuffing, and the pies were top-notch. Delicious, but I felt rather obese afterward.

thanksgiving 2.0: real Thanksgiving at Grandma's
       My flight home got delayed 4 hours, so I enjoyed food vouchers and an empty SLC airport, plus got home at 3 in the morning. My dad is a champ for picking me up from the airport and going to work 4 hours later. Spent a few days in snowy Sammamish, then headed to the grandparents for a family thanksgiving, complete with post-meal naps and Black Friday scheming.

thanksgiving 3.0: Colorado Thanksgiving
     Early Friday morning I headed to Colorado for a little time with the Kaiser fam and this boy. New state, new adventures, including a thrilling Nuggets game, which brought us the only picture I took the entire trip. Saturday was another Thanksgiving, where I ate turkey and kind of liked it. plus more pie. Thank you Kaisers, for being excellent hosts. 
We had a thrilling drive back, and I even succeeded in driving through a snowstorm. Take that, winter!

Basically, I just love Thanksgiving so much I had to celebrate it three times. and I loved every minute of it. I sure am a lucky girl!

"we live in a beautiful world, 

            yeah we do

            yeah we do"

(Thanks Coldplay. and iphone.)

joyous

 I wish life was like this all the time.
I'll be in a lot of airports next week and would love for this to happen. just sayin.

Happy Monday!

live from salt lake...

I got in touch with my inner reporter yesterday and had one of my most exciting election days yet.
I'm in a poltical science/broadcast journalism class about journalism and elections. Since I am neither a fullblown polisci or broadcast student, I am a little out of my element, but it is interesting to see things from a different perspective. Our whole semester has been leading up to yesterday, our election coverage for KBYU.

I spent the day with two lovely broadcasters, following around Sam Granato and Peter Corroon, the Democratic candidates for Senate and govenor. Met at Corroon HQ, went to Granato's store for lunch with the fam, followed Corroon on a visit through the AFL-CIO. I tagged along through it all.

Then it was off to Democratic HQ at the Marriott to get ready for the results. True, Democrats in Utah aren't super exciting, but it was cool to see. We walked in to the ballroom as they're setting up; the 4 big news stations had great set-ups on the side of the room. KBYU was sitting on the floor, Internet-less. Well, we pulled some strings, made some friends, and scored ourselves some wireless and a table. We were in business. Soon they started setting up the bar right next to us, and I knew we were in for an entertaining night. I didn't have a ton to do, so I watched and soaked it in. These broadcast students sure are on top of things. They did a great job. And the emotion of the room was intense as the night wore on. Concession speeches, reactions, poll results--we were there for it all.

What a memorable/long day/night!

Setting up--news stations with their fancy set ups, and the lovely bar

Command Central--our set-up for the night

Granato's concession speech. Dems love him.