Giving the thanks.

Hello world of the interwebs! Welcome back. 

Thanksgiving break was freaking awesome. Any break from school is awesome, but it was especially nice to go home for the first time all semester and spend time with my family. I flew home on Wednesday night and we ate some dinner and hung out a little bit. (side note, my dad bought me a selfie stick on one of his China trips so I had a lot of fun with that but unfortunately I left it in San Ramon) 

Thursday was the BIG DAY. For those of you who don't know, Thanksgiving is easily my father's favorite holiday. We are big foodies and love to cook extravagant meals, so a day devoted to a huge feast is easily our favorite holiday. I think he would be very upset if any of us ever missed a Thanksgiving, because it is a big deal! 

Here's my first selfie stick photo. 

After cooking in the morning and watching the Thanksgiving Day Parade and Dog Show, we got ready and took our Christmas card photos. While I waited for the turkey to finish cooking I had some solid cuddle time with Dewey and took a great selfie to commemorate the occasion. 

Here's our Christmas card picture! Taken by my iPhone's self timer in our backyard. 

And another selfie stick picture while my dad finished bringing the food into the dining room.

While my love for Dewey is quite vocal, many people don't realize how much I love Charlotte. I know a lot of people don't like cats, but I strongly believe that's just because they haven't met the right cats. Charlotte came into my life on a fateful Thanksgiving day in 2002. Let's recount the story of Charlotte and I meeting. 

My mom was going to get a kitten for Christmas that year, and she had always wanted a Tonkinese cat. My dad found a breeder and she brought over her latest two litters of kittens to our house (7 cats in total). Best. Day. Ever. There were 5 boys and 2 girls. Being that I was a 7 year old girl, I was adamant that we needed to get a female cat. While my parents and sister were becoming enamored with a sweetheart male cat, I found Charlotte. She crawled into my lap and began purring and I refused to let her go. Since the rest of my family recognized how sweet the male cat was, and how quickly I had bonded with the female, the breeder offered us a special deal for the both of them and we ended up with 2 kittens. That was more fun anyways because we came up with fun names. Charlotte and I have been together through Texas, Johannesburg, and San Ramon and I still couldn't begin to imagine falling asleep at home without hearing her purring next to me in bed. 

She also understands me when I meow to her so there's that. 

On Friday I went out shopping in the morning with my dad and then went home to watch the U of A/ASU game. It was awesome! So awesome that I fell asleep in the middle of it. It's ok because my dad stayed awake and clued me in. Then I woke up and we went to dinner.

On Saturday my dad and Katie both flew out of town so my mom and I went shopping (again) and then had dinner and went to the movies. It was such a fun girls day! Of course we had to get Vitality Bowls for lunch - it's a must on every San Ramon trip. 

After dinner we walked around Downtown Walnut Creek and I had my first CREAM sandwich in months. It was just as heavenly as always. 

I got back to Tucson and back into the swing of things pretty quickly. The Monday after break I had a huge project worth 1/3 of my grade due. I had a ton of other papers, projects, etc. that week so I was doing a lot of homework. I finished my final project for my online class too so now I am 100% done with that class. I am glad that I buckled down last week/before break because now my load is much lighter than it would have been and I am not as stressed out. 

This Friday night, we had a potluck at Dakota/Bert/Rory's house to watch the Pac-12 Championship game. It was kind of a sad game to watch, but still fun to be with friends. We are still so proud of our team for making it this far. No one expected we would end up in the top 10!

Saturday was totally crazy! We went to line up for the basketball game against Gonzaga at noon. The game started at 3:15 and was probably the most intense game I've ever been to. We were neck and neck the entire game and went into overtime. I honestly forgot to breathe and got super light headed at multiple points in the game. 

The game didn't end until 5:40 which stunk because Lauren and I had makeup appointments (using coupons I had) at Sephora at 6, and we were supposed to be there ten minutes early. We ended up not even getting there until 6:30 with the game traffic. We finished up around 7:30 and rushed home to change for the dance. The Winter Formal was super fun! Shoutout to DJ Gabe and DJ Luca. The bomb diggity. Today was seemingly the first normal church day in quite a long time which was nice. After church Syd and I watched 3 Christmas movies so you could say we've had a really productive day. All in the spirit of Christmas and gearing up for finals!

Luckily I only have two actual finals (the others are papers/projects, of which I have finished 2 out of 3). I know these next few weeks will go by super fast! I'll be back home again in 12 short days. 

Peace out. 

On November 18, 1995, a star was born....

In true 1320 fashion, it is time for the birthday blog post. Dedicated to my gurl Syd Rich. Since I did 18 things I love about her last year, and I still love those things, I decided to do something a little different. If you'd like to read last year's post, feel free to refer to the link below. 

http://stephlshaw.blogspot.com/2013/11/to-my-best-friend-syd.html

So this year I decided to highlight 19 amazing memories that I've shared with Sydney in our 1 and a half years of friendship/living together. 

1. When we went to the Killers concert May 2013 and learned a lot from the audience about what Mormons are supposed to look like and do (sarcasm duh). 

2. When we got free Chipotle after waiting in line for 15 minutes for chicken and freaking lettuce. What the actual crap. 

3. When Syd took rocking engagement pictures for Taylor and Natalie and I gracefully photobombed some of them. 

4. When we discovered the "True Facts" videos and realized that the Tarsier is the creepiest creature on earth. 

5. When Sydney interviewed us with the best getting to know you questions and some of the answers were very interesting. 

6. When we went to Wal-Mart and I bought a watermelon and it rolled out of my trunk and across the parking lot and Sydney helped me chase after it. 

7. When we discovered Google Hangout and video chatted with each other even though we were in the same house. 

8. When our weeds in the backyard grew even taller than Syd. 

9. When we hunted down Baja Blast for an entire night and couldn't find it, but then saw a man with a case of it on the back of his motorcycle and asked him where to find it. That stuff is serious business. 

10. When Lauren used to be in charge of setting up for dances so we would spend the entire day of the dance decorating with her and she asked us to spray paint wine bottles. 

11. When we took Theatre Appreciation together and had buddies to go with to all of the required performances. 

12. When everyone and their brother was doing the Ice Bucket Challenge and we had the best house for it so we were doing at least 2 a day. And Sydney was the champion ice dumper. Especially for Cody Pulsipher. 

13. When she indulged my weakness for the baby elephant at the Tucson Zoo and went with me to see it. 

14. When we reenacted Taylor and Natalie's engagement on the top of Mt. Lemmon even though Sydney wasn't there the first time it happened. (I totally said yes)

15. When we went to the Phoenix temple open house and Avery casually "texted" on her phone that doesn't work throughout the entire tour. 

16. When we went to Terror in the Corn for the second time and a creepy clown made us nearly pee our pants. 

17. When we did a workout video that one time and the black man spoke to all of our souls. He really let the music move him. 

18. When we had the most mind-blowing missionary object lesson of all time. Ever. And Elder Dayley spelled out "LSD" instead of "LDS" and we all cried from laughing. 

19. When we got free monsters for the first time at Circle K and could only take mine into the game. But then this year only Syd could take hers into the game. It's fine because we're good at sharing. 

It's tricky to sum up all of the amazing times that we have together because it seems that we are always cracking up and crying/almost peeing our pants from laughing so hard. There is a good time to be had no matter where Syd Rich goes because she brings the party!! I know that there are an infinite number of good times that we have had and since there are so many it's hard to remember them all. I hope you have the best birthday in the whole world Syd because you are worth it!!!! Happy 19th :) Congrats on being the same age as me and for being a lovely young woman. Love you squirrel!

This is Halloween.

Hello beautiful internet users. Welcome. Let's backtrack to last weekend which was HALLOWEEN aka the greatest holiday aka the beginning of the best time of year aka one super crazy fun night. 

I worked until 5, poopy, but then I rushed home and started getting ready! I had been planning my Katy Perry costume for so long. I ordered the wig in August and spent countless hours shopping for and making my shirt and tutu. I usually don't get that into Halloween, but I am very passionate about respecting Katy Perry so I felt I needed to do her justice. I got ready and put more glitter on my eyelids than I previously thought was possible. Then Sydney took some rocking model photos of me outside our house. Here are the best ones, in my humble opinion. 

Baby you're a firework. 

Once everyone was ready and Caroline and Jared were at our house, we all went over to Chipotle to get our $3 booritos! This is one holiday tradition I have definitely gotten behind. I love any excuse to go to Chipotle and to get a steak burrito with guac on it for only $3 is a miracle! So worth the wait in line. 

Wait....who knew Taylor Swift, Katy Perry, and Kesha would all be at Chipotle?

Apparently Hulk Hogan was spotted that night as well. 

And we bumped into a robber (NOT a burglar)

Then we went off to the dance and it was crazy fun, as always. Even Prince showed up and performed for us!

The DJ played Firework by Katy Perry which meant that everyone pushed me up on stage and I ended up giving a rocking lip sync performance. Craziness! Then they announced the costume contest winners and .......I WON! I won the prize for the singles costume contest which means I get a month of dollar lunch for free! Super exciting and it felt good to know that my hard work and money paid off. We got home and immediately crashed after partying so hard. 

The next morning we got up bright and early (at like 8 haha) and got ready to head up Mt. Lemmon with our dear friend Isaac. For those of you who don't know, 1320 started an annual Christmas card last year, with Isaac being our photographer. He is so good and professional and very affordable! We pay him in food. I don't have access to all of the pictures yet, nor do I want to ruin the surprise so I'm only including a couple. 

While on the mountain we stopped at the Cookie Cabin which had the world's best giant cookies and some normal tasting and sized pizza. 

And here is your one sneak preview at our fall-themed Christmas card photoshoot!

The week progressed just as any other week except for Wednesday. I have decided to clue you guys in on a painful experience of mine. Let's get some context first. I have super incredibly sensitive skin. I have been shaving for like 10 years, but I constantly develop horrible rashes. I've tried shaving, waxing, Nair, epillators, etc. NOTHING WORKED. I am also extremely hairy, so leaving my legs to run wild isn't a very good option. I visited the dermatologist this summer and they gave me two creams to apply to my legs twice a day. These creams cleared my legs up in a day or two, but they said laser hair removal would be the most permanent option. This has been such an issue in my life (as seemingly insignificant as it sounds) and my parents are so amazing that they agreed to buy me a Groupon for laser hair removal for my 20th birthday. My birthday isn't until February, but the treatments can take up to a year so it's an early gift.

 I went in for my first treatment in August having no idea what to expect. Dang did it hurt! It took a full hour and I was writhing in pain the whole time. After the treatment, my hair growth was stopped for a week or two. Then I started the shedding process (gross, I know). The hairs look like they are trapped under the skin but if you exfoliate they all come out. Then there were a glorious few weeks of absolutely no hair. I felt like a Chinese crested. But then the next cycle of hair growth started and I had leg hair again. For those of you who are curious, your hair grows in 3 cycles which means it takes at least 3 treatments to stop the hairs from growing back. These treatments are around 8-10 weeks apart but it differs from person to person. 

I went back for my second treatment on Wednesday and I was brave enough to ask if I could use my phone during the treatment (I thought the laser might zap my phone into oblivion). Luckily, I was able to use it so I could distract myself from the pain and also take some lovely photos. Oh my goodness gracious this time hurt so much more than last time. I walked out of the building shaking from being in so much pain. Luckily this treatment only took around 35 minutes. 

Here are my beautiful glasses to save my eyes from the laser. 

Here is the evil contraption the lady uses on your hairs. The marks on my legs are how they section your body off so they know which parts they have already gone over. 

And....what I look like immediately after. Don't worry, I've been assured that this reaction is what it's supposed to look like and it means my body is taking to the laser well. And the redness goes down after fifteen minutes or so. 

After that painful ordeal, I went home and met up with Syd. I took her to Chipotle for her early birthday surprise and then I took her to go see Flashdance on campus! Last year we were in a Theatre Appreciation class and we were required to go to plays on campus so this is kind of our thing. Plus who doesn't love a good musical? Especially one with 80s music in it. It was so amazing! I'm so glad we went. 

Last night there was a Relief Society dinner that Lauren organized and ran and it was so delicious! And I am always extremely grateful for a free meal. Today is the start of Homecoming weekend and the Richardsons are coming to town! We are going to an event for Brother Richardson's old fraternity and then tomorrow, my mom is coming to town before the game! I am so excited for this weekend and to finally see someone in my family after being away since August. Bear Down!!!!

You've had a birthday, shout hooray!

Guys. It's that time of year where the time flies by so freaking fast. Like I don't even know what has happened to October but it's basically over. Since time is flying so fast, I feel like I hardly remember what I have done for the past week or so, but I will try my hardest to recount that information.

On Monday we had FHE and we built some AWESOME candy sculptures. We were divided into teams and either though the other team won, I think our sculpture was still absolutely beautiful.

On Tuesday I had school and work as usual, and then Syd and I went shopping for some stuff for our Halloween costumes :)

Wednesday night there was school and work again. Shocker.

Thursday's math class was pretty cool though! We have been doing a lot of stuff using manipulatives and on Thursday we got to use pattern blocks. The dividers in the container the blocks were in were sliding all around and not clicked into place. That drove me insane! So I took out all of the blocks and spent a good chunk of class reorganizing the blocks so they were all color coordinated. After they were all color coded, doing the problems was so much easier and I was able to finish with extra time to make some beautiful art pieces! I'll start selling them on Etsy pretty soon. Obviously.

On Friday I did a bunch of stuff around the house and got my Halloween costume done! It looks awesome and I can't wait to show everyone!!! 

Saturday morning I drove up to Mesa for my main homegirl Avery's birthday party. For months she has been inviting everyone to her Elsa party and I am SO happy I was able to come. She is so super sassy and I had so much fun hanging with the four year olds. Brought me back to San Ramon where I am a party planner all summer. So much fun! 

Here's Avery and her boyfriend's little brother. Getting chummy with the fam. 

I had my first Bahama Bucks during the party! Which was pretty darn good. I'll definitely be going back whenever I'm in Mesa! It's also a Texas thing so maybe I'll hit it up over Christmas break. 

Avery refused to pose normally for a picture, but we love her for that. Super sassy. 

There happened to be a snowball fight, and lemme just tell you, homegirl in the pigtails had quite the arm. She is going to be a pro softball player. 

The party was so much fun and I'm so happy the Richardsons invited me to go! Tomorrow I get to register for my final two classes and then I KNOW this week will fly by even faster than last week. Friday is Halloween, Saturday we are taking roomie pictures, and then the week after that is Homecoming and when my mom is coming to visit! So many exciting things coming up, and I can't wait!!! 

Praise the Pumpkins

Sooo on Friday after classes Syd and I partied it up on the way to Phoenix. We were going to the open house which was super amazing! It was beautiful and such a cool experience. I feel so lucky to have been able to go to not only the Gilbert open house, but also the Phoenix one! So beautiful. 

Temples are the bessssssst. 

The whole gang. 

After the temple we went to Zupa's for dinner and it was delicious! Zupa's is one of my favorite places. So yummy!

I spent the weekend at the Richardson's and it was a party as always. On Saturday we headed over to Schnepf Farm for their annual pumpkin and chili festival. It was so awesome! They had a pumpkin patch, rides, county fair attractions, and more. 

Along the way we stopped for gas and caffeine and I found this beautiful car. 

At the Farm we got to go see the pumpkins! I'm not a HUGE fan of pumpkin flavored foods so I had to express my white girl powers with the pumpkin patch. 

And a classic Steph Shaw pose. 

The gang joined in after seeing how adorable I was. 

There was a sign that looked like it would have facts about bees on it and there ended up being absolutely NOTHING under the flaps. It was so incredibly disappointing. 

However, there were some awesome sunflowers to take pictures with as well.

The farm was so fun and I was so glad that I was able to go with the Richardsons! They are always having a super fun awesome party time there. It was great to go up to Mesa to get away but now we are back to reality! And school is going to be over before we know it. I am shocked that this semester is already over halfway through with. After Thanksgiving break it is just going to fly by!