today was a fairytale

once upon a time girl flys to utah, girl sees boy, boy and girl play all day monday, girl decides she likes boy, turns out boy likes girl. boy and girl hold hands at the movies. girl is on cloud nine.
The end. :D

it's girls camp, girls camp

this video my best friend Julia Larsen and a few of her friends made pretty much describes my past week. minus the mountains. and the sunshine. it rained all week and was completely exhausting. as always, by the end of camp i swear i'll never go back again. my twelve year olds kept my up late, depleted my ear plug supply, and hugged me more than a person should ever be hugged. but now that i'm home, i can't help but smile at a few of the good moments i had this past week. like, going to the bog with Bryn and Briana, enjoying the one day of fantastic sunshine on the lake with Erin, singing campfire songs, sitting next to Lorrie durring testimony meeting and getting to share my testimony with everyone. my friend tessa pointed out that girls camp really is a celebration of a full year here. after all, i had lived here for two days before i was shipped off to camp last year. after she pointed that out i couldn't help but love it just a little more. and i loved being a YCL.

Briana, Me, Bryn, and our twenty lovely twelve year olds.
headed to the bog.

so maybe i will go back next year, we shall see.

next on the summer adventures list?
i leave for the airport at five tomorrow morning.
hello Utah.
i've never been away from home for more than three weeks and i'll be in utah for four. plus, i've seen my family for lest than twenty four hours in the past two weeks. this is going to be interesting. i love summer. it's just flying by so fast. bummer. hey. that rhymed.
i'll try and keep you updated this next month. it's going to be CRAZY though.
here's to more summer adventures!
forever and always,
Sarah Leslie

while i'm away...

hey nonexistent readers! my best friend julia is probably the coolest person you'll ever meet. or in your case, probably never meet. even though we've only known eachother for about two and a half years we became close friends quickly and now despite the fact that we live two thousand miles away, we're closer than ever and i'm proud to call her my best friend. plus, we make a good lesbian couple.

we totally didn't have her brother take creepy lesbian pictures of us when i visited the end of april. well, we did, but we're not lesbian. promise.
anyhoo, while i'm at camp i figure you may as well spend your blogcreeping moments wisely. Juj recently started the cutest blog ever. it follows her every day life of total amazingness and is super fun. i dream of dresses is pretty much awesome. yep. that's where it's at. so while i'm spending some quality time with ticks, sun, dirt, lakes, twenty one twelve year olds, and blisters...you can read about her super awesome life that i secretly wish i lived. yep.
well bye.
forever and always,
sarah leslie

SUCCESS.

YEP. today i passed my drivers test.
next on the agenda? pack for girls camp, begin to pack for utah, pack my entire life into boxes, buy bug spray. awesome.
forever and always,
sarah leslie

basically...

i miss this.

i miss my males and females.
take me back to EFY.

the most wonderful week of my life

                                  EFY 2011

thank you for the most amazing, and wonderful week of my entire life. i loved every moment of it. i'm sitting here at my computer a much stronger person, going through the most EFY withdrawls i've ever been through. it was the best company i've ever had. the people are so amazing and the fact that they all live so close means the world to me. this week i was just reminded that i am a daughter of God. i'm so excited for the rest of the summer. i always forget how fast things go by there. tears were shed, laughs were spread, and i became friends with some of the most amazing people. i especially enjoyed getting to know James and Jeff better. i can't believe that they were in my company. MALES AND FEMALES unite! best company name ever. seriously.
if you've been to EFY you know why i can't put my week into words. i'll just share another picture instead.

                     seriously. why did this week have to end?
forever and always,
sarah leslie

summer.

i did it. i finished my first year of highschool here. oh boy have i enjoyed the past few days. summer vacation = the best thing ever. i've mostly been sleeping in and spending time with some friends that i won't get to see most of the summer. i can't believe how crazy things are about to get. summer has never been this crazy for me. i have never been this busy or have been away from home for so long. i won't be at home for about six weeks straight. that's crazy. i'm so looking forward to all of the adventures that i'm going to have this summer. i can't wait for EFY next week. it's going to be so fantastic to get to meet new friends that i get to see at mormon dances and have in my life for the next few years. this summer is going to be so different from last. i hope it will be anyways. although i do find it funny that we're moving again and switching schools again. at least my ward will stay the same. i don't think i would have been able to handle things if i didn't get to stay with my ward family. i'm just going to enjoy my summer before i start stressing about school though. i'm ready to relax and not have to worry about grades and projects and waking up at five in the morning and getting into college and every other little thing i seem to stress about. i'm just going to enjoy it one crazy summer week at a time. i do wish utah had more lakes though. i guess while i'm there i'll have to settle for a kiddie pool. not that i haven't made that work before.

---Sarah and Julia, summer 2009---

these are memories that i want to remember forever. this is why i'm going back to utah for a month. because i deserve to do stupid things with my best friend over the summer.
anyhoo, on another note, tomorrow is sunday and lucky me still has not done my last minute efy shopping. i guess i'll be making a late run tonight. it would be a lot more convenient if i had passed my drivers test and could take myself. then again, the stick shift car is the only one at home and i'm pretty talented with helping it stall. it will come with time, right? right. now i just have to get my lisence. that's a summer must. i would have passed if the old lady giving me the test hadn't looked like this:

dead serious here. okay so i turned into the wrong lane on a one way road too but that's besides the point. seriously.
so here is another funny story. today i decided to make brownies for sunday school tomorrow and i burnt them. yep. i. burnt. food. i seriously burst into tears. since when do i make stupid mistakes like that? since now apparently. oh well. i guess i just won't be bringing brownies to sunday school tomorrow. well i'm off. i'll blog about EFY when i get back. right now, i'm just looking to more memories that look like this:


---EFY 2010---
hopefully the guys will be taller though :D
here is to a fantastic week.
forever and always,
sarah leslie

boredom in english

I took my english final early which seemed like a grand idea at the time. but now m sitting in here ALL day with nothing to do. the movie we're watching just cracked a rude mormon joke and the whole class just looked at me funny for like five minutes. not really five minutes but a long enough ammount of time that it was awkward. awesome. love being different. today when was getting ready tried something new. blush. feel like such a flirt now and will definitely be wearing it more often. am done blogging now. kidding. it's kinda fun to be sitting here on my blackberry. it's nice to know that even when m in utah and won't have access to a computer will still be able to blog. m super excited for summer to get here. don't want it to go by too fast though. worried that it will be gone in the blink of an eye. especially because I won't actually be free until the second week of august. I don't think ve actually had a summer that has been this crazy and eventful  EVER. it will definitely make for some great stories come this fall. more than anything wanted a summer romance, full of butterflies and giggles and smiles. but now I'm starting to realize just how unrealistic that is. plus even if it started as just a summer fling don't think I'd be able to emotionally handle it. if it were to present itself with the right guy I probably wouldn't turn it down but that's something to figure out for later. great. the same movie just cracked a joke about salt lake city. not really enjoying this movie that much. at least look cute today. does that sound stupid? probably. okay, well here is to two and a half more days of school. if you made it thorugh the word vomit this post was well, congralutions. if not, totally understand. btw. it's not letting me type I's all the time. hence, the incomplete sentences. oh well.
Forever and always,
Sarah leslie

they call it love

it all started in eighth grade. i had a really fantastic idea, and no idea how to write it. luckily, i was quickly becomming best friends with someone who did. that was the beginning of what turned into a three hundred page fan fiction written by yours truly. i can't really explain what i loved about writing those words, but i loved it so much. it was as if every word was real, and not only was i the person writing it, but i was also the person living it. i dreamed of the day that i could have a love story as perfect as the one i was creating in my book. there were times that i wished i could have the chance to play the main character, to get to feel loved like payton did. but then something amazing happened. i wittnessed a relationship like the one i had written in my story before my very eyes. boy meets girl, girl likes boy. girl creepishly stalks boy. boy plays along with girl. boy confesses love to girl. boy and girl hold hands. boy and girl become great friends. boy and girl become more than friends. in my fan fiction, Joe lies to Payton about his true identity, and they fall in love. Payton falls in love with someone who is keeping something from her, and when she finds out, she has the opportunity to give it all up, but she can't. Payton has fallen in love with this person, and is willing to except that even though they did something really stupid and jeopardized their relationship, people make mistakes. sure, he lost her trust for awhile, but she can't deny what they have together. sometimes it's hard to forgive people and continue loving them. forgive and forget is easy, but putting it behind you while continuing to live your every day life is a challenge. i just don't think i could've let payton make the other decision. i don't think i could have watched her give up someone so amazing, someone who makes them so happy, just because of a mistake. sure, it lost her trust, it hurt her, and was a blow to her ego, but she was the better person and put it behind them. my point is, Payton and Joe didn't miss out on anything. they became stronger because of a few things that went on between the two of them. sure they are my fictional characters, and i pour my heart and soul into my writing, but i want them to be real too. i just think that when you meet someone who makes you so happy, you shouldn't let them go. as i was writing, i knew both payton and joe's sides of the story. i knew that the two of them would be happier together than alone. sure, i made them that way, but the same thing applies to the real world. a relationship is learning to make sacrifices, to forgive other people for their flaws. especially in highschool when you're learning who you like and what traits you want the people you date  to have. i hate to watch two people i love so much be heartbroken like this. i hate the fact that someone i'm so close to is blaming the entire thing on theirself. i just want everyone to kiss and make up and love eachother. of course, it doesn't help that i've lived my own relationships through their eyes. it' s not my fault people are intimidated by girls who are 6'1. anyways, if the people reading this could just listen for a minute and think. think about everything your special someone has done wrong. does it really matter in the end? yes. but don't the good things make up for the bad. for me they always do.
forever and always,
sarah leslie

finals, stress, and a CRAZY summer.

right now i have four days of school left. no biggie, right? WRONG. it's finals week and apparently the people here enjoy giving us tests worth 20% of our semester grade. i don't even remember the stuff i learned at the beginning of the semester. i know it's good practice for college and all but come on, that's college, i'm just a sophmore in highschool. luckily we have late starts on tuesday and wednesday and we get out at noon on thursday. then i'm done for the summer. not that my summer is going to be relaxing or anything. that's okay though i brought it upon myself. three days after school gets out i'm going to efy here which i'm super excited about. then the day after i get back from EFY i'm off to girls camp, and the day after i get back from girls camp i'm off to Utah for a month. i get back from Utah on the 25th of July to a brand new house which my family will have moved into during my absense. then i have a week to get settled, do TONS of laundry, and unpack my bedroom before one of my best friends Maiya flys out here to visit on August 2. i'm so excited that i'm finally going to have a visitor up here to show everything to, and to go back and tell everyone how awesome minnesota is :D secretly i'm hoping i'll get more visitors eventually. we shall see. anyways, maiya leaves on the 9th then i have to get straight to job searching, i'm hoping all the people headed off to college will have just quit their jobs and people will be hiring. i need a job bad. then i plan on working for the remaining three weeks of summer and then it's back to school. junior year peoeple, i'm actually going to be an upperclassmen. weird. anyways, this summer is definitely going to be one to remember, with so much going on and of course i've recently become legal dating age. summer romance? ;D gosh i can only hope so. well, i'm super excited for this summer and just need to get through the next week. i can do it right? right. well, my chicken stirfry is marinating in the fridge and my brown rice just beeped at me so i'm going to go. here is to a crazy stressful week, and a FANTASTIC summer. no worries, i'll be back here updating on my adventures. most of them anyways.
forever and always,
sarah leslie

a year worth remembering

today is june third. it's definitely a date i'll be remembering for awhile. it's our year mark people! i'm so happy with the person i have become throughout the past year. it has been so hard, not going to lie. but, the person i am today is a completely different person than the person i was 365 days ago when we moved. my priorities have changed, and i've learned that it's okay to not always have something to do on a friday night. early morning seminary ended two weeks ago for the year and let me tell you, i miss it dearly. because of the sacrifices that my brother and i made to wake up at five in the morning every day and drive fifteen minutes to the church to attend seminary i am a better person, and honestly looking back it hardly seems like a sacrifice anymore. i got so many blessings in return. being one of only a few mormon girls at my school this year has also been such a challenge and a blessing. i love being different, i love the fact that i stand out and that some people refer to me as "that mormon girl" sometimes i think that i'm not doing a very good job at answering the questions that people ask me on a daily basis and i wonder if there is someone else that would be better for the job. there isn't though, and every other mormon teenager out here feels the same way. we're just going to have to keep on trying. i've done so many things in the past year that i never thought i was capable of doing. not big things like climb Mt. Everest, but small things like try new foods, go running in negative twenty degree weather, bake a three tier cake, sing in sacrament meeting, become friends with people who live an hour away, strengthen my friendships with people who live back in utah, take drivers ed, fail my drivers test, drive a tractor, dance in the rain, catch fireflies, go on a two day backpacking trip, give up basketball, fall in like, fall out of like, fall back in like, cry over crazy teenage girl emotions, begin writing a book, become addicted to mint gum, switch lives with someone who i had never met until a month ago, learn to laugh through trials, continue to be an example for my friends, find a knee length skirt outside of utah etc. there are so many things i'm proud of that have happened in the past year. of course, there are so many things i wish were different too. my grades are nowhere where i would like them to be and if i want a chance at getting into BYU i'm going to have to work my butt of the next two years. of course, right now i'm just trying to enjoy the next two years. i'm so grateful to the people who have helped me through the past year. especially my parents and my best friend Julia. it hasn't been easy, but it has been such an adventure and i wouldn't change a thing. here is to another fantastic year people!
forever and always,
sarah leslie