Sometimes, I get freaked out by how quickly time passes. I feel like 2012 was just 11 days ago and now it's already 2013.
crazy.
seriously though, last year went by so quickly. I always have those existential moments when a new year starts: did I really live a whole other year? what did I do with my life? did I do everything I wanted to? was I good to people around me? am I a different person this year than I was last year? am I a better person? did I really eat all of the christmas fudge?
i know, you're jealous. this brain is a deep one. but honestly, I wonder about these things (especially that last one) and i think about what I want to do different this year than the last, what I want to be better about, and what I want to keep doing. i'm super pro-new year's resolutions and although i haven't outlined them to a T yet, here's a quick list of what I want to do this year:
(1) lose weight. this kid has gotten fat. this is not me throwing a pity party for myself. this is truth. in that sense, marriage hasn't been good to me. Casey is my #1 partner in crime when it comes to eating yummy things.
(2) exercise. this kinda relates to #1, but it's also a thing I want to do for me. this semester, I'm taking 17 credits and working about 25 hours a week annnnnnd i've got to do about 60 hours of volunteer tutoring/observations for school so life is gonna be a little crazy. i'm hoping that exercise will be my happy time. Cait and I found a free yoga class at school that meets twice a week. you bet your bottom dollar i'll be there.
(3) church stuff (attend the temple, love my calling, and be involved). i loved my last ward, but the calling i had kinda kept me out of the loop of churchyness. we were in that ward over a year and our last sunday, someone approached me and asked if i was new... which was no bueno. SO. I'm going to be more active in my ward and really become a member of my ward family.
(4) love my family and friends. the other night, i was driving home and very suddenly, i had this little breakdown thingy. it wasn't a bad breakdown; it had actually started out as a prayer (sometimes i pray while i drive. i don't know how to drive in snow so good so this happens a lot. you should give it a try sometime.) and turned into a small happy-tears cry fest, in which I thanked my Heavenly Father for all of the wonderful people in my life. after this experience, i realized that i really want my family and friends to know how much i care about them, how much i love them and that i'm someone they can count on. God only blesses you with one family so you might as well love them. you get to choose your friends and they need to know why you love them too.
(5) do stuff. "oh, good one, Kristin. how did you ever come up with that?" Here's what I mean: i want to do fun things with my life this year. As a student, it's easy to forget that life is supposed to be fun because there is SO MUCH STUFF YOU HAVE TO DO ALL THE TIME AND IF YOU DON'T DO IT, THE WORLD IS GOING TO END AND EVERYONE IS GOING TO HATE YOU. don't worry, imma do that stuff, but i also want to enjoy my life and have fun too. i want to explore utah a little more, go fun places, do fun things with friends, and make sure that i don't just get bogged down by all the not so fun stuff. make sense? "yes Kristin- you're a genius!" oh, you're too kind ;)
and that's that. i feel good. it's gonna be a good year :)
other random thoughts:
- there is way too much snow outside my house. way. too. much.
- we moved recently and there's this magical gas station close to our casa where you can get really cheap drinks AND they have flavours you can add to your drink. i'm currently drinking a cherry-vanilla Dr. Pepper. it's fabulous.
- this one is kinda sad: remember my guinea pig, lloyd? well, the move ended up being hard on lloyd. after the first snow, we noticed our heat wasn't working and it got really cold in our house (50 degrees... it's a lot colder than it sounds) and lloyd got a cold. he got over the cold, but just wasn't the same after and died on Christmas Eve. i had been telling Casey that he was going to die on Christmas because you could just tell that he was miserable. i cried. it was really sad, but i'm okay now. lloyd was a good little pig and i hope he's not our last (this is a debatable topic as Casey was not lloyd's biggest supporter, although, for what it's worth, he said he missed Lloyd's 'feed me' squeaks).
- i've been listening to Eve 6, Unwritten Law, and Wolfmother a lot lately. I feel like these are bands that are highly underrated. i like them. you should too.
- i've seen The Hobbit 3 times. it's amazeballs. if you haven't seen it, GO ASAP. it's just a really beautiful film and the muuuuusssiiiiic. oh my goodness. it's beautiful and lovely and awesome. just listen to 'misty mountains'. you'll see what i'm talking about.
- i also saw Les Miserables and i loved it. i know a lot of people have disliked the movie. to them i say, "shut up, you're stupid. it was amazing". okay, so i would never really say that, but hear me out: i think a lot of people went to the movie expecting it to be like the play. this was silly. i think that's like expecting James Earl Jones and Elijah Wood to read the Bible the same way. silly. the movie should be different than the play because it's a different media with actors who are acting. they're also singing, but they're predominately actors first. Does Hugh Jackman have the range and musical talent of Colm Wilkinson? of course he doesn't. but did he bring the emotion, power and integrity of Jean Valjean? absolutely. Is Russel Crowe the best Javert ever? probably not. Did he express Javert's inner conflict and self-loathing because of the choices he's made in his life? beautifully yes. so yeah. it's a good movie. go see it. cry your heart out and enjoy it :) embarrassing story: i went and saw this movie with my mama because we've long loved Les Mis and the last 30 minutes of the movie is just super devastating and we were crying a lot in the theater. like ugly crying where you sob uncontrollably, make ugly noises and people stare at you. good times. no regrets.
and now, imma go to bed. nighty tight :)
