The Holiday

Ok, ok. You are probably sick of these... but I'm not! Here is a movie trailer my sister Emily made from the Holidays.

St. Louis: A True Story

Gotta love the new iMovie. I threw this bad boy together in a few minutes.

If I could choose one thing that I enjoy doing the most, it would be hangin' with my family. There is nothing else like it, and I would say I lucked out a lot. I would also say that Christmas gets better and better each year. It's because there is usually a new grandchild or two and we are always in a different city. This year, me and all 6 of my siblings, 6 nieces, 1 nephew, 3 brother-in-laws, and mama Nancy all stayed under one roof at Jessica and Scott's gorgeous home in St. Louis, Mo. Can you say FUN? The days consisted of a few visits to the movie theatre, chatting, playing games (the celebrity game seems to be the fave), eating, cooking, browsing at the mall, playing with the kiddies, relaxing with a good book (I have started the Harry Potter series!), doing crazy stuff in the basement, me and Ethan playing Life (the new electronic version), frozen custard, curling my nieces hair every day, admiring each other's crafty talents, beating Super Mario 5 times on the Wii, Amy doing weird stuff in her sleep, watching disney movies on a laptop, secret santa exchanges, Walmart runs, gossip magazine readin, playing with "the claw" and other xmas presents, watching youtube videos, and mainly just sitting around and enjoying one another's company.

I got to take my sister Jessica's kids' annual pictures for her living room wall.

(Jane, Sophie, Grace, and Ethan)

And here are the beloved family pictures for 2010:

7 kids + Mom

7 grandkids + Mom

and a little lagniappe...

Welcome Back

This video made me happy.

Tomorrow, tomorrow

I am starting my new job tomorrow and I am quite anxious. I am so grateful that I found a job and cannot wait to get busy. I am teaching a Journalism Yearbook class and doing some curriculum development for a Web Essentials and Web Design class at Open High School of Utah. I finished my lesson plans for the first few weeks of the yearbook class. I'm not too sure how it is going to work since I kind of made this class from scratch. Overall, it's going to be a very busy next couple of months with this job while looking for a full time job for the Fall. I'm applying to D.C., maybe Houston, maybe Atlanta, maybe even Seattle or Portland or maybe Africa. We'll see. I would love to head to the east coast though. What do you think? I am [SO] ready for a change of scenery.

....Here is a song Amy threw together the other day...http://picosong.com/cgN/

Happy Monday! I'm off to Zumba!

"And then I fell into a manhole"

I am waiting for Amy at school parked outside of the TEE building, talking on the phone with Sarah, when I hear someone banging on the window. I look around and Amy is screaming at me. I hang up and go out to see what Amy is yelling about and there I see her pointing at a huge manhole. It seems that she dropped her keys into the manhole right next to where I was parked. My first thought was, "great, she has the only pair of house keys." (I had lost mine a couple of days before." Second thought, "ok, ok let's call BYU or Provo City and figure out who would be able to help us." Third thought, "We are at the perfect building on campus (technology and engineering building) with probably some of the best resources, let's put our problem solving skills to good use."

As Amy started to calm down, she points to the license plate next to ours, and lo and behold ...

It's a fish.

She then says, "let's go fishing!"

So we run upstairs to the woods lab. We find exactly what we needed. We find a huge long wooden pole from a trebuchet. We then strap on several magnets looped around a paper clip with duck tape.

As we are walking back out to the car, we started laughing because we found exactly what we needed and we knew it was going to work.

We got the keys on our first try!

It is probably a combination of our cajun blood and engineering background that attribute to our great problem solving skills.

(And you are probably wondering why this post is entitled "And then I fell into a manhole." It's an inside joke we have with a few friends in the ward because the first counselor's wife gave a talk for the first time and the first thing she said was that she fell into a manhole while she was texting. I guess no one else thought it was as funny as me and Amy because no one else was laughing. Hence, we thought is was ironic that Amy's keys fell into a manhole.)

To end, here is a picture of me and Amy g-chatting with Eleanor and Sarah after the ordeal...Happy Friday!

New Car

It's been months since I've had a real blog -- so here I go. Thought I would start out with the car that I bought while I was student teaching last semester. It is THE best car I could have asked for and I feel so blessed to have found the perfect one for the perfect price. My old bishop helped me find it at his car dealership. He really is such a great father figure to me and takes really good care of me.

At Gene Harvey, my bishop works with his 2 brothers, who were so sweet. They even took a picture of me in front of the car for a calendar that they send to all of their customers. I am so glad that they documented this. Amy is in the front seat if you can see her.

If I could express into one word how I feel about having a car, it would be FREEDOM! I finally feel like an adult. After 10 years of public transportation, begging for rides to the grocery store in the snow, waiting at the bus stop in front of a bar in New Orleans hoping I wouldn't get killed-- I can finally get to places with no hassle. However, I do miss walking to places so I can daydream, not paying for gas, and how it built some character in me. I am trying to pay it forward by giving people rides when I can. I could also say that I feel quite spoiled because I don't deserve this.

Oh and did I mention that I got my driver's license a couple of weeks before the big purchase?

I would say all in all it was a good year in 2010. Along with a new car and a driver's license, I also finished my "dreaded" student teaching (a.k.a best semester of my college career) which led to me graduating in December. I learned from this experience that my calling in life is to help kids, specifically secondary school students. I LOVED my students and have been back a couple of times to visit and it fills me up with so much joy when I see them. Most importantly, and this is going to sound cliche, but I learned that if I try hard enough and trust in the Lord, then I can do anything. I accomplished tasks and problems that I never thought I could do/face.

It feels pretty surreal to be done. It seemed just like yesterday that I was idolizing my beautiful older sisters and how graduating like them seemed so distant.

As for the new year? It's gonna be a great year. The next chapter in my life includes new goals, new jobs, new adventures, and I am ready for the Lord to guide me in the direction He desires most for me. Having a plan scares me and I am trying to do my best, but if I could see for just one second the Lord's plan in comparison to mine, I know that I would hands down choose the Lord's plan.

Have a great new year and let's DREAM BIG 2011!!!

Stay tuned for "What I did over Christmas Break"... (a sneak peek can be found here and here)

A Day in New Orleans

A Day in New Orleans from Laura Hansen on Vimeo.