Bonfires, Corn Mazes, and Hayrides

Sometimes papers, tests, and projects almost push me overboard, but I'm doing well in school. It's been hard to stay on top of though. Luckily, I have a Bear to love me and keep me motivated. That is the most delicious pumpkin pie ice cream above in Lexington. It makes me very happy.
 
Bear pretends to hate the cat, but I keep finding them together. He's just such a fun kitty to hold and cuddle. He really is a dog. 

We were lame and didn't go to the homecoming dance this year. We had planned a double date to go on a hayride and to a corn maze, and finally the dance, but Bear had a scrimmage with another school that day, the only one before the season and was going to take up the whole day. I was supposed to sing in the women's choir for the homecoming concert on Friday night, so it looked like we weren't going to be able to do anything fun that weekend.
 
But the boys surprised us and planned a bonfire up at Panther Falls for us. I love surprises!  
And we got to go to the hayride and corn mazelast weekend, as you can tell from the pictures below. The weather was perfect on both Saturdays, so it really worked out. I even got some sun at Bear's scrimmage (which I happened to not take pictures of him playing).
 
I got an A on my Intro to Music History midterm. I worked hard on that baby so I'm proud of myself. I thought I knew music, but it's teaching me so much. I'm learning to pull words out of my head for papers or presentations easier now.
  
I have also learned recently to make sure you bought a zucchini instead of a cucumber, and then after you find out it's a cucumber...don't try and bake with it! Bear wouldn't even eat it, and that's saying something...the adventures of a beginner cook.  
I am in love with Virginia in the Fall. I wouldn't give it up for anything. The view above is from our hayride. Love, love. And we're also a few days past the half-way mark of the semester. I feel like a weeny because I don't have a legitimate job or play any sports, but my schedule is really wearing me down this semester. So I'm very grateful and looking forward to my easy next semester. And I'm getting so excited for Thanksgiving and Christmas to be with family again.
  
Last weekend was what I really needed. I was able to catch up on sleep and go have fun on a double date with Rachel and Zach. The date was so much fun! We went to the hayride and corn maze like I said before, but it ended up being more for little kids. We still had fun of course. I put more pictures up on Facebook. Then we went to sushi in Lexington, went back to our apartment to watch "Darkness Falls" (which ended up being very stupid), play Ligretto, and drink homemade pumpkin white hot chocolate. I hadn't laughed like that in a long time.
 
The picture above is our super awkward perching or "owling" picture. We also took these pictures at a park right by the sushi restaurant while we were waiting for it to open. 
Bear turned 23 on Sunday. I bought him some Nike id running shoes with his name on them in school colors. And a baseball bracelet, and a baseball sign for the house (so maybe that was more for me). i made a German chocolate cake, and listened to him complain about how old he is. I love him so much and I hope we have 77 more years together! There was a bomb threat Sunday night, but we were off campus and unaffected by the lock-down. 2 people got arrested, but we don't know who they are. All the buildings on campus had to be searched between 1 and 4 am. Poor students had to be evacuated out of their dorms. The school handled it really well though. Class went on normally on Monday (I think to teach everyone a lesson that pranks don't get people out of class). Even though I got sleep, I was hoping for no class too, but that's SVU for you. The stinky thing was it was right before some important accreditation people were coming to tour the school to see if we've been doing well. Hopefully they'll notice how well the problem was taken care of. And although students mumbled and grumbled about it, I'm glad everyone's safe.


 Sorry I always talk about homework. But my next goal is to survive a book report on a book on Socialism that I'm behind on, and a 8-10 page paper on Mozart's 41st symphony. I can do it. 

Wool Coat

 

Bear bought this pink wool coat for me! I'm so excited for it to come in the mail. It's so dressy and feminine. I'm happy that I'll have a coat that I can wear to church. I can take the bow tie off if I want to to. And I'm not one of those people that gets mad if you happen to like the same style as me, so if you want one too, click HERE.

It was hard to choose from all of the different colors, but in the end I decided I wanted a happy color one instead of your typical black or grey wool coat. It just makes me happy looking at it!

This one is watermelon red, and then there's gray, light pink, red, black, beige, and camel. 

Happy, happy.

Pumpkin Patch

Life has been crazy busy, but has also been very good to us. I've had 3 tests, 2 presentations and a major paper since I last updated, which I thought were going to be the end of me. Tutoring has been coming along. I make $60 a month. And it's just about as much as I can handle right now. 
 
General Conference was just what I needed. I got my answers and it really helped me through these crazy school weeks. We passed our first cleaning checks too (which were a nightmare!), which is something that makes us very happy. I've also started making dinner every night. I get the ideas from Pinterest.com. Some days I'm too stressed out and Bear says, "let's just have leftovers." Those words are just what I need to hear (even though there's usually no leftovers). But I'm pretty proud of myself knowing that I'm budgeting, eating healthy, and making good food for me and Bear. I'll be sure to post some of the good things I've gotten from that lovely site. 
 
One of my presentations was in my Political Philosophy class. I was super nervous and asked Bear to give me a blessing. It's an upper division class, and I had to be prepared for the questions and debating comments my classmates would throw at me at the end of the class. I felt like I did a horrible job, but I got 44/45. So prayers and preparation do work. And somehow I've been able to stay on top of my homework. It's kind of a miracle.
 
 I went to my first drive-in movie last weekend. It was my second time seeing The Help, but Bear hasn't seen it yet. I cried even harder this time. There was something so fun about sitting in the back of our truck bundled up in blankets in the fall night weather that made me really happy about life at that moment. 
The leaves are starting to change outside. There's this one particular tree that I can see from our living room window that is absolutely breathtaking. Tuesday was a day off from school for going to the DC Temple. I really wanted to go, but we had just recently been and it's 3 hours one way. I felt so guilty, but I felt like I just needed to focus on me and Bear and to take a breather after our crazy two weeks. One of the things on our Fall bucket list was to go to a pumpkin patch, and I found this one about an hour away from us in Monroe, VA. The whole drive was gorgeous. We drove along the Jame River in the Blue Ridge Mountains with all the colorful trees. Virginia is so beautiful. This little old man owned this pumpkin patch in the middle of nowhere. We were pretty much the only ones there. We picked out unique gourds, along with a white pumpkin and a pink one! Pink I tell you! It's actually more of a salmon color, but I claim it as pink. The little old man with the Appalachian Virginian accent said he'd never seen one like it before. Usually that kind has little brown knobs all over it. But this one was acne free! I'm quite happy. Decorating them has made me quite happy too.

We are very happy. I hope you are too. We're going on a hay ride and to a corn maze this Saturday. I'm really excited!