a message

If I could send a message to my life, the world or something equally abstract, this is what it would say:
I may have been wrong a time or two, let's be honest mostly I don't know what the heck is going on. But regardless of that, you've taught me so much and shown me things that only you could show me. The memories created will probably stay with me for a lifetime, maybe even longer. I'm grateful for the time I've had so far, and I hope that there will be more time in the future. I don't know what you will bring me next, but so far you've only brought good...any bad that has come has been my own doing. I feel like I should apologize if I ever made things too hard, but let's be honest. I'm talking to something abstract here...that would be silly. But if you weren't abstract, I would say sorry for being a crazy person some days. And thanks for liking me anyway. I'll try to take what I have learned through my association with you and keep it with me so that it can help me grow into someone that I want to be. I might be a little bit lost right now...you could find me if you wanted to.
Love, Amberly

i want this.

some love...

Sometimes I think about the boy that I am going to fall in love with. I wonder if I've met him, what he's doing, and where he is. I wonder what he will be like, if he will like music, what he will look like. I hope that his life is good and that he is happy. I want all the best things for him and I hope that someday I will be the best thing for him. I'm very much looking forward to falling in love and getting married. I hope it will be soon--but not too soon. There is a lot I want to do before I get married. But someday, it will happen for me. And I am really excited for that time in my life.

Some Photoshop Stuff

Last night I put Photoshop on my laptop. :)

Marissa

Tonight my darling friend Marissa asked me to take a quick headshot of her before she goes to a Broadway camp in California next week. You need to understand, this girl is the most incredibly talented person I know. She has been in over 30 shows, including a ton of stuff for the Church. She knows Sister Dalton personally because she's gotten to work with her. She goes with her family to do humanitarian work all the time and she's really just the most genuinely sweet person. I LOVE to be around her, to talk to her and I try to emulate her. Marissa will do amazing things with her life and I'm glad I got to take a couple of pictures of her. :)

Clue

Yesterday I wore make-up and did my hair for the first time all week. When you wake up at 5:00 am it doesn't make much sense to get ready. But I wanted to look cute last night. And I looked dang cute. I went to a play with some friends, up Provo canyon in an ampitheater. It rained and rained and rained. I was hoping a certain someone was going to come and keep me warm. Unfortunately I had to keep myself warm. And the rain turned my hair from freaking cute to crazy butt. So when I finally got to see a specific person, I was not looking so cute. But that didn't seem to matter. :)

when life gives you crap...

Grab the plunger. Today when I got home from work, I discovered the joy of a clogged toilet. I have dealt with this kind of thing before, but usually I have the opportunity to share it with my dad and he takes care of it for me. In this case I had no such option, seeing as my parents are currently out of the country. So I grabbed the plunger. As I plunged, and plunged and kept plunging, I started to think about all the "crap" that life tends to dish out. Sometimes the "toilet" can get clogged with all sorts of unpleasant things to deal with. In these cases, we have some options. We can ignore it and hope it goes away, we can dump it on someone else for them to deal with, but sometimes we simply don't have that option, and in that case we have to grab the plunger.

Sometimes when we start plunging, a little bit of the crap water splashes on us, so we learn how to handle it so that that doesn't happen again. After a few plunges, we may think that the problem should be fixed, so we try and flush only to find that we made it worse. So we finally figure out that the only way to fix the problem is to keep plunging, keep going until the result is finally seen. It is unpleasant. It isn't fun. But it is necessary. And just when we think that the stupid toilet will never unclog, there is a beautiful gurgling noise and voila. All the crap is gone.

In my life, I've been given some crap. And I've tried to ignore it for a while, or dump it on someone else. But I know that that doesn't work. So I've grabbed the plunger, and tried to fix the problem. Sometimes I go in with good intentions but I haven't quite figured out how to handle the problem, and some crap water gets on me. And there have been times when I thought the problem was fixed, only to find that flushing made it worse. Sometimes it feels like it will never get better. But I know that if I keep plunging, there will someday be a beautiful sound and I will know that I have successfully unclogged the toilet.

I'm really grateful for the opportunities that I have every day to learn and grow, even from the unpleasant experiences. Unclogging the crap from the toilet isn't really all that bad in retrospect. This won't be either.