My 24th Birthday!

Yesterday was my 24th Birthday and I had an amazing time! My friend, Jennifer, took off the entire day from work to hang out with me. I have done my birthday breakfast at the Original Pancake House ever since we went to the one in Vegas. The Utah one isn't as good as the Vegas one, but it is still really good food. Jennifer, her sister Amanda, and my friend Kristen, that I work with, came with me to breakfast. Then Jennifer and I headed over to Brewvies and saw Bad Teacher and Bridesmaids. They were both pretty funny, but it was also just fun to have the day off from work, watch comedies and eat the awesome fries. :)

Next came dinner at the Olive Garden. Even though the family jokes about it all the time, it actually really is one of my favorite places to eat. I love Italian food! I had had so much to eat by the time we went to dinner that I wasn't even too sad when I found out that they no longer serve the dish that I went there for, or serve my favorite drink. I still had a great time with all of my friends that came!

This is my friend Crystal. We went to school together. She was the person that planned the trip down to Moab.

This is Candice. She is also one of my photographer friends from school. We try to go to lunch together at least once a month. She is awesome. :)
Wendy came down a day early from Idaho so that she could make it to my birthday dinner. It was super nice of her!

This is Valor. She is another of my photographer friends and I have started doing a couple of shoots with her. We did the ice castle shoot together, and she was my second photographer for Torrie's wedding.

I'm sure you all recognize Liz by now. She is my friend that also models for me all the time. She recently just applied for America's Next Top Model and I really hope that she gets on it! Liz paid for my dinner, and had the waitress and waiter bring me a piece of chocolate mousse cake and sing to me. It was embarrassing but fun.

Natalie was also able to come to my birthday dinner! She is running a half marathon tomorrow. Good luck Nat!

Then my friends Jennifer, and her husband John. After dinner we all went to see Horrible Bosses and then Friends with Benefits. 4 movies in one day!! I absolutely loved it! :) My kind of birthday! It was so relaxing, and it was just super fun to spend time with all of these awesome people. The family dinner is going to be on Sunday. I wish my Alaskan family could be there too. I miss you guys!

So, I am 24 now. I realized that a lot of what I would like to say about being 23 and turning 24 was said on my new year post and the other things I have reported since then, such as giving a kidney, and being robbed, and my first car accident that killed my car, and finally becoming a manager and graduating. So, that is basically the summary of 23. On with 24! :)

Catching Up

First off, I am sorry that it has been so long since my last blog post. For reasons that I have speculated about, I feel lately like I have very little energy for anything. For a while, all I did was work and sleep. I didn't want to go on photo shoots, I didn't really like driving to hang out with people, or really much else. Really, if I wasn't taking a nap, or sleeping 12 hours I was at work. So, I am doing better now. I still feel tired often, and I am still working a ton, but I think that my store is starting to go better and my energy to get out and do other things is getting better.

Some very worth while things to mention that I have been neglecting to post about, first off is the arrival of my niece Sophie. She is so beautiful and I love holding her and trying to make her laugh. I love when I ask her to tell me a story and she tries to talk to me. She is so adorable! So, welcome Baby Sophie! I am so happy to have you in my life and I am sorry that I haven't added you to my blog sooner. :)





The next thing I want to mention is that I am officially a college graduate!!



With graduating, I wanted to thank everyone that helped me get there. When you graduate you are supposed to give someone your Stool of Gratitude. I thought about it and gave it to my dad. Even though there are so many people that helped me get through my college years, my dad gave me my first SLR camera, lent me his digital one until I could afford to get my own, gave me studio lights and helped me pay half of my tuition until I got my scholarship. He has been completely supportive and tells me that I am a better photographer than he ever was. So thank you Dad for everything that you have done for me. :) There are so many other people that helped me too though. I really should mention that Wesley gave me a laptop with photoshop on it that really helped me through my last year of college. I should thank Liz and many of the other people that came to model for me whether they wanted to or not. Thanks to Torrie for getting me started in photo classes at SLCC, and so so many more. Allison gave me my very very first camera since I asked her to borrow it so often. Kjersti and Jay often helped me come up with some of my creative ideas and drove me around to take my pictures. Danae and Gary also helped model for me for some of my projects, so just thank you so much everyone! My best friend, Jennifer, let me cry to her all of the time about being overwhelmed with school and work and I am just sorry for everyone that had to deal with me while I took on way too much.



I have met some of the coolest people in the Photo Program in my four years there, and I hope that I will stay friends with these people for the rest of my life. They truly are amazing and I love them so much! We recently just took a road trip together down to Moab to celebrate our graduation. We had an amazing time!




Liz also came with us and was kind enough to model for us! Valor bought a wedding dress from the D.I. so that we could do a trash the dress shoot. I am still editing the pictures, but here are some of them so far:









I have also been working on some senior pictures for some friends/employees of mine that graduated from high school recently. Here are a couple of those:







And of course, my friend Torrie got married at the beginning of May. I did her engagement pictures and photographed her wedding. Here are some of my favorites:













So, because this post is getting ridiculously long, I would just like to add that they convicted the man that robbed me. So that is good. And I wanted to thank everyone for helping me get my Graduation Present. I got a 22 inch IMAC and I think I might be in love. It is so beautiful. :) Thanks everyone! I will try and post more often!

Managing Bountiful

So, I have some big news... I am now the Manager of Bountiful!! Justin called and asked me on Monday, and told me that I would be starting Tuesday, although my store won't know until a meeting on Thursday. I guess that manager there was stealing a lot, so Justin needed to get rid of him. I don't understand people that steal from their job... They get caught and then they aren't making any money at all. He denies that he did anything.

Justin did give me a raise though, and I am going to start getting quarterly bonuses. Another benefit for me will be that I will be able to make my own schedule now AND it is only five minutes from where I live so I will save a lot on gas money! Downsides are that I am going to really miss working at 4th South. I had some good friends there and I put a lot of time and hard work into making that store run well. I know it will be fine once I feel like Bountiful is mine, but I don't yet.

Academy Awards

Every year, after the Academy Award nominations come out, I try and watch everything nominated for Best Picture. Some years it doesn't happen because I run out of time, or I am too scared to watch one of the nominations. Last year they changed it from five Best Picture Nominations to ten. The ten nominations for Best Picture this year were (listed in the order that I saw them):

1- Inception
2- Social Network
3- 127 Hours
4- Toy Story 3
5- Winter's Bone
6- The Kids Are Alright
7- True Grit
8- The King's Speech
9- Black Swan
10- The Fighter

I did manage to see them all this year, and even in a more timely manner than usual. Some years, I can't believe the movies that the Academy has nominated. Every once in a while, the Academy and I agree, but overall the last few years have made me wonder why I do this. The Hurt Locker winning last year, No Country for Old Men in 2008 and the Departed in 2007, make a running streak of some pretty depressing movies. so, the last few years, I felt like the Academy was telling me that the world was going to hell, and there wasn't anything that anyone could do about it. This year, the movies nominated were SO MUCH BETTER!

If I had to pick a running theme for the nominations this year, I would say that the theme was family. Whether it is the blood that ties us together, the family that we create for ourselves, the family that support us, the family that we are trying to get back to, the father we are trying to find, or the one we are trying to avenge, the mother that passes down her own issues, the family that we didn't appreciate until we almost lost them, etc... This year I felt like the nominations were about who we are, where we are going, and the things that we have to sacrifice to get there.

I was also pleasantly surprised with awards themselves. Lately, even if they do nominate a movie I like it doesn't win. I was happy with the winners this year though. Natalie Portman won Best Actress, Colin Firth won Best Actor and the King's Speech won Best Picture! It was a tie for me whether I wanted Inception or the King's Speech to win, so I am happy. I was only disappointed that Hans Zimmer didn't win Best Original Score for Inception because it is amazing. I also really loved the speeches by the winners this year. Natalie Portman and Colin Firth were so cute. One of my favorite speeches was by Christian Bale though, when he thanked his daughter and said that she had taught him so much more than he could ever teach her. It was a fun night, and I have faith in the Academy once again.

Midway Ice Castles

On Thursday, after going to an awesome lunch with Natalie, I went with a few friends up to the Ice Castles in Midway. I believe this is the second year that they have been there, but they are actually made by a guy that lives there. They were really cool and I had a good time with my friends and Geoffrey. A group of us are actually going back in a couple days to do a photo shoot up there. Should be fun! :)