P is for Pictures (and Parties)

I've been home for exactly two weeks and one day and everyday has seemed like a party. The Christie boys, our second family, came two weeks ago from tomorrow and we have been hanging out, swimming, going to the lake, and going to frontier city, the amusement park. We've taken tons of pictures and videos of tubing, boating, rollar coasters, and jumps off the diving board. Not too much to write about and most of the pictures are on the other computer.

Alli and I at the airport with the welcome home sign she made me.

(Notice the backpack--I really did backpack Europe!)

AD and Kevin after a spaghetti dinner.

I love my brother, this shirt is perfect for him!

AD and I at the arcade making tons of dough, well, tickets.

We are so fierce! Yes, we earned 1700 tickets on the Elvis coin machine. That's what I like to call skill.

No worries, I didn't pass up the photo booth! I was slightly confused on where to look and when to pose...

This is me on the boat. Boating makes me happy!

That's all for now. Hopefully I'll have another blog soon. Let me know what yall think of the new design.

Love Lauren

C is for Construction

My blog is now officially under construction. Please let me know if you would like to do my blog design for me or know of places where I can get cute designs. I like the corner on this, but the hot pink and blue are too much.

D is for Dancing

So today I was obsessed with watching dances from SYTYCD and this was by FAR my favorite. It's amazing. Hip hop to Bleeding Heart, and it works! I probably watched it twenty times. Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r5mUv3_2Qig

A is for America

That's right. I'm back in America. Home of the free, land of the brave. It's good to be back where everyone speaks English, or at least tries to! I'm excited to be home, but sad my adventures have come to an end. Not to mention I will not longer see my dear friend Heidi who I have spent pretty much every waking morning with since April 30th till July 5th. I realized when I got back how bad I was at keeping in touch via email and updating the blog, as well as journaling. So, I'm either going to be making changes on the blog, or making a scrapbook, which everyone will be welcome to see! If anyone wants a preview of what I did, you can look at Rachel's blog. We weren't there at the same time, but she is there now and keeps it very updated and I have done pretty much all the same things!

Anyways, it is great to be home. I was separated from my Europe partners, Heidi and Spencer in Washington D.C. when they stopped there and I was going on to OKC, and I realized during my 4 1/2 hour layover, that it was the first time I have been by myself doing my own thing since before I left for Jerusalem. What did I do to past the time? Well, the first hour was spent getting through customs and dealing with a crying baby. At this point I wanted to slap a little kid in the face and be like SHUT UP ALREADY! I know, this doesn't sound very kind, but this is after I was on a flight for nine hours when half the time some people in the front, I never even saw them, let their baby scream and scream and scream. There was a point where they let it scream for about an hour or two straight. No exaggeration, ask Heidi and Spence. No one picked it up, or tried to help it or anything. I think they were French.

Anyways, after customs I proceeded to the terminal where my flight was. I left my cellular in Provo, so I called my mother from a pay phone. I used a phone card for the first time in my life. The phone card was a gift given to me by my neighbors for my high school graduation. Being a college grad, I decided to cheat the system by calling her and giving her the pay phone number to call me back. So she did, and I felt like a drug dealer answering a ringing pay phone. We then talked for over 90 minutes. The other two hours were spent wandering the halls wondering what I should do with myself. I think I walked the terminal 15 times. Finally, I was able to get on the plane, I pulled my pillow and blanky out of my bag, got my sudoku and ipod and patiently waited on the 3 hour flight back home.

While on the phone with my mother, I told her if anyone loved me they would be at the airport, with signs, when I got home. This was my welcome crew.

Yes that sign says, welcome home Lauren when are you going to get a job? And yes, that is toilet paper AD is holding. She always has had potty humor.

Yes I look nasty, but keep in mind that I just backpacked Europe for the past 17 days and I had been traveling for around 22 hours (that includes traveling to airports, waiting time, and flights).

I'm home safely and just chillin in OKC. My four little boys are coming today so our house will be a party for the next two weeks! If anyone wants to visit me, arrangements can be made. :)

Love Lauren

U is for Update

Sorry guys, long time no update.

I love Jerusalem! It's been amazing here! I've been able to do so much. Here is a brief update of what has been going on. We went to Galilee for ten days and it was absolutely wonderful! We went all over the place in the Galilee and swam in the sea of Galilee. Brief places that I remember going are Caesarea, Mt. Tabor, Nimrod's Castle, seeing a 2000 year old boat, Mount of Beatitudes, and the Galilee Branch of church. We have been to soo many places, those are just the ones I can remember off the top of my head.

The other day we had a really exciting field trip, we went to Masada, walked around there and saw one of Herod's castles. It was pretty cool. We then went and floated in the Dead Sea and found mud and put it all over ourselves, not going to lie, it wasn't that fun and with open cuts the it breached being painful, but it was all worth it for the crazy pictures we took. We then went to Ein Gedi, the spot where David hid from Saul. There were amazing waterfalls there -- so pretty! After that we went to Qumran, where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. It was then we found out how much of a baller our professor is--he is a master of Israeli things and Hebrew and helped to translate one of the scrolls. Amazing. Anyways.

Here are pics. Enjoy!

Love Lauren

heidi, me, and allie at masada

floating in the Dead Sea

ethiopian women, we let our hair down, literally

ashley, me, dr. seeley, and heidi and qumran

random pic, me and allie overlooking the dome of the rock, mount scopus and the mount of olives, if you look to the top left, the "mormon university" is cascading down the top

and no worries folks, they have diet coke in israel, boo yah

E is for Egypt

I just got home from Egypt late last night. Man that was an intense trip. I'm having a lot of fun here at the Jerusalem Center, but the work load is really, really, really intense. We got back last night around 11 and breakfast was at 6:30 this morning followed by 5 hours of class, and 2 assignments due at 9am, not to mention every class had reading due. Straight. Needless to say, it is now almost ten and I just finished my paper and I'm about to attend my first class of the day. I do have a good excuse, I was sick on the miserable bus ride home from Egpyt. I can barely talk right now and I'm betting I can vomit on command.

Well folks, better update to follow when time permits. I'm having trouble attaching pictures or they would be ALLL over the place. I have some great photos. Peace.

Love Lauren

J is for Jerusalem

Long time no update. Jerusalem has been a TON of fun! Pretty soon I'll just put up a link to pictures because I have a LOT and the internet here is horrible and won't let me upload anything. Anyways, I'm having a great time, I'm leaving for Egypt in the morning for a week, but I will update when I get back!

me in a cave
israel independence day in tel aviv
ice cream in tel aviv