What's been going on...

Oh hey there! You probably have been wondering where I've been  you probably don't care where I've been, but I'll tell you anyways.

I survived Summer semester. I LIVED!!!!!! I know, right?! I still can't quite believe it myself. I truly didn't know if I was going to make it, especially at the end there. It was honestly the Summer from Hell. And I am not even exaggerating. Doing math all day/every day for 3 months straight is not the way to live life if you don't want to be borderline suicidal folks. Just sayin'. It was so bad. You don't even know. And there is no way I can express it in words to do it justice how awful it was. So glad it's over. So, so glad.

Fast forward to the present. I have been in Fall semester for a good 9 weeks now, and life is crazier than it's ever been before. I am taking 15 credits (my last math class, Statistics, included) and on top of those credits I am taking two internships, which are two separate nights each week. I go Tuesday and Thursdays in the morning while Dylie is at school, drive back home in time for him to get home, then I drive back down to Orem both nights to go to my internship. Then I am there most of the day Saturday for my weekend classes. Yep, I am officially and certifiably crazy. And I feel like a recluse. But somehow, as crazy as it sounds, this semester is still way better than summer was. I don't feel like I need to be in a straight-jacket so that's a good feeling. I feel super overwhelmed, and burnt-out and just want it to be over, but I'm not crying every day from wanting to kill myself. And I am also happy to report that I've been able to get back into my gym routine that I completely lost over the summer, so that's good. I go 2-3 times a week (that's all the time I have) but I am there for longer than I usually was before so its good. I lost a lot of stamina since I wasn't able to make it this summer, but it is a good stress reliever and it makes me feel healthier so that's nice. 

Dylan has been back in school which has been amazing. He loves going (he goes 4 days a week) and he is constantly telling me everything they learn about and sing about while he's there, and the littler friends he plays with. He is getting better and better with his speech and sentences. He is really starting to be better at answering questions he's asked, and using full sentences, which has been awesome to see! We are still trying to work on how clearly he talks sometimes (he likes to talk so quickly at times that you can't catch what he says) but he is improving so much and we are so grateful for that. It's awesome be be able to communicate with him almost fully! We are so proud of him. And it's so good to see him love school. I know that won't last, so I will eat it up while I can. He has been SUCH a trooper with my crazy schedule. It's amazing how patient he has been with having to drive down to Provo with me several times to meet Brett (if that's where he's working that week) or to just be good to entertain himself while I am planning lessons for my internship or doing homework or Face-timeing with study groups. He's one in a million. We just couldn't love him more or be more thankful for him.

Brett is hard at work studying for the CPA exams (1 down, 3 to go) on top of working 40+ hours a week. As hard as it is, I am SO proud of him. He is working his tail off along with being an amazing dad and husband. I don't know how he does it! He studies at least 20 hrs per week, but if it's a good week, he does 30. Can I just tell you how fun it is to not see my husband ever? It's just so great. We constantly talk about crazy our life is right now, but we need to remember it's only temporary. We are lucky some days to honestly even see each other before one of us is asleep. Some nights I don't get home until 10 or 10:30 from my internship, and the nights I'm home Brett is at the office working and studying until that late. And in the mornings I have school I have to leave at the buttcrack of dawn, Brett stays home to get Dylie off to preschool then leaves for work. I leave before they are even awake so I don't see either of them. And on the days I don't have school, Brett is up at 4:30 so he can study before he starts his workday.  It's crazy. As I type this I can't believe how psycho we are for doing this all at the same time. I'm just thankful I am crazy busy or else it would be way harder on me than it already is. And Dylie seems to take it really well too. Well, as well as you can expect. He doesn't complain, and he understands that Daddy is at work, but he doesn't love it. But, I am grateful because one of us is always here to put him to sleep. There have been 3 times this whole semester (when Brett was out of town for work) that my mom had to put him down because I was at my internship. So we are doing our best to make sure we are here to put him down and keep his nightly routines going. We call Brett throughout the day so Dylie can talk to him, and we just try to have as much family time together as possible on the weekends, even if it's only for an hour or so, or at church. 

So don't worry. This post was first titled "Halloween 2015" cause I wanted to blog about halloween, but then it turned into an update post. So I'll just leave it as is and post about Halloween in a few. I hate that I haven't been keeping up on here. I need to be better so I can remember, especially this time in our lives. It's so hard and it sucks majorly, but it will be so nice when it's all done to look back on it all and relive it and think "if we made it through that, we can make it through anything." That's how I feel right now. I don't know what I'll do with myself when this is all over. I am so used to being so jam-packed with stuff going on, that when it's all done, I don't know if I'll love it or if I'll miss it. I guess we will see next Summer :) And if you made it to this point, you are awesome! 

just keep swimming...

So i am going to be really optimistic here. If you are a mom (or anyone for that matter) and thinking about going back to school to get your degree, don't do it. Just..don't. Stay away! Stay far far away! Save yourself the time, energy, the money (oooooh the money!) and stress and just stay home with your littles (or your tv) and live your life and love the fact that you didn't put yourself through an absolute fire full of misery,

Okay, i may be exaggerating by a tiny hair, but honestly, not really. What am I doing? Why am I doing this to myself? I truly feel like I had some sort of death wish and this was my perfect plan to bring it to life. I am on week #3 of summer semester and I am, and have been since day 1 of the semester, feeling like I am going to drown. It's taking all I have to stay above water and to be able to breathe; sometimes I lose air. I am losing air with each massive assignment that keeps coming my way and that keeps piling on. In those moments I honestly curse the world for not giving me a brain like Steve Jobs or Tony Stark or Bill Gates...just able to do anything and everything and feel and be super smart at everything I do. Oh what I would give to have a brain like that. But no, I feel like my brain is the size of a marshmallow and absorbs all the information I am learning about like a marshmallow would...hardly at all.

I have talked to several of my classmates (and new friends :) who are all in the same boat as me and all agree with the fact that this is definitely the hardest semester of our college careers. Not only is the block (there are two in the semester of Summer, block A and block B, and both are 7 1/2 weeks long) almost halfway over (that thought only makes me want to pee a little...it terrifies me) the courses that we are taking are the exact same courses as they would be in a regular semester, they are just almost 1/3 of the time. Same course, same curriculum, same assignments. What they don't tell you is that the stress level isn't the same as a regular semester...it goes up by about 100 fold. They don't take out any assignments, tests, readings or lectures. It's all there, and I am left sitting here each night wondering why I decided to torture myself in this way.

But, as miserable and as lousy and as hard as the last few weeks have been (and will continue to be), something amazing has been happening. I have been proving to myself that I really can do more than I thought was possible to take on all at once. I am somehow (by the grace of God) making it all work. I am getting A's on assignments that are ridiculously hard, I am ahead of schedule in my math class (WHAT?!), I have made friends and have been able to learn from them and grow from them already (I never used to socialize in college classes, probably because the classes were ginormous, these classes have an average of 15 people in them which is so nice),  I am attending each class (driving the 35 minute drive down and back 3x/week in terrible construction) and feeling really good about what I am learning and understanding at least some of what I am learning. I am in the 4300 level classes, and those are not easy my friends. And they definitely aren't easy in a block semester, so I am kinda rocking my own world for a hot minute. And on top of all that, I am actually reading my assigned readings. I have never before done this (and I somehow wondered why my grades weren't so great). I am not going to sugarcoat it; reading them sucks, and being quizzed on them (hence why I am reading them) sucks even more. But, it pushes me to get my booty in gear and make time to do the reading and highlight and soak in what I am reading. I have never, EVER been like this before in my life. Not in middle school, not high school and most definitely not in my first few years of college.

Something has changed in me...maybe it's that I've actually matured in the way of education, and seeing how my time and money are super important to me, I don't want to screw it up. I want this to be a good experience, and I want to do the best I can. I even cancelled a family trip we had planned over Memorial Day to the Grand Canyon because I had a buttload of homework and I felt that was more important than my fun family getaway. Like, who does that? Nerds do, that's who! And I am proud to have become one. It feels so good to stay on top (and ahead) of my classes. It was so worth canceling. It would've been amazing, but I got so much done it was well worth the wait, and to know when we go someday I won't have homework in the back of my mind the entire time stressing me out. It could wait. The homework, as sad as it is to say, couldn't. When I was in college before I never would've made that decision. I'm telling you people...Growth! Maturity! They have finally found me. Oh, did I mention that I got straight A's last semester???? Yeah, I couldn't really believe it myself so I am not surprised if you can't either. But it's true. What is happening? I'm getting A's, running in races and getting up at 5:45am 3 days a week. Something is not the same here. A switch has flipped.

Oh, and, on top of all this, I have still tried (not incredibly well, but I'm getting better) to keep playdates with friends for Dylie and I to keep us both sane, I am cooking dinner every night, I am being a mom and reading and playing with Dylan when I can (sadly Netflix has become a daily for us so I can get homework done as well, but if I get him out of the house or play with him for a while each day, I definitely consider it a win), being a wife who tries to spend at least an hour with her husband each night just cuddling (okay, I'm mainly crying my stress away on his shoulder, but that counts as cuddling right?) while he whispers how proud he is of me and how happy he is that I am working so hard (as I think: "damn right I am") and also keeping the house in a more manageable state then it was before this semester started. I am also blogging more then I have in a year. You'd think with all my homework and the million other things I need to get done, I would not even think about blogging. But no, I have more of a desire then I have had in a long time to blog and to add it to my list of things to do that is 12 years long.

Washing the dishes (because our dishes hadn't been done in a week and a half so the dishwasher was overflowing with them so much that I needed to do half of them by hand) and Dylie decided he wanted to help so he grabbed his stool, rolled his sleeves up and jumped right in.

How we stay sane..yep there have been more days then I'd like to admit that we have stayed in our jammies all day. But there's nothing better then going and getting ice cream at 3 in the afternoon in your jammies :) We also have pantless Chalk Drawing days.

Something is driving me. I am not sure what it is....Brett gave me a blessing before this semester started because I was terrified of what was to come (oh if only I had known the sheer terror and horror that lay before me, had I known I wouldn't even be in this mess) and since then, in the last few weeks, I have had a drive and a force pushing me to be better, do better and try harder, all while feeling tired, stressed and like I want to give up at times. It's such a weird and crazy feeling...feeling both happiness and stress in the same moments. I truly am so stressed out of my brain that I honestly at times swear I can feel it frying like bacon, but I am so happy at the same time. I wish I could explain it. I have a love/hate relationship with it. Maybe this is what it feels like to be pulled and stretched like they talk about in General Conference? You know that something called growing and how they say it helps us reach our full potential one small step at a time? Maybe this is what that feels like. Such a strange but amazing and hard feeling to feel all the time.

The one thing that has suffered is my consistency at the gym. Sadly something had to be bumped while I adjusted to school and the reality of how much time it takes from my life, and that has been the one thing that I have needed to incorporate back into my routine. I was going 4-5 times a week before I started this semester, and I have now been exactly 0 times since I started school. I plan on getting back into it at least 3 times a week starting next week, but it's also been a learning experience to know that I can survive and still feel okay if I don't make it to the gym all the time. But what I miss about it is how good it made me feel and how much it helped me cope with stress (and boy I could definitely use a stress-reliever right about now) and how much energy I had because of it. I have found myself getting much more tired these days, and I know it's because I have not been getting any sort of workout in. Gotta get back to it! Even if I need to wakeup earlier or stay up a little later, I know it will be better for my brain and stress levels.

I do not write this to boast or brag. Trust me, I know I could be doing this with a happier attitude most of the time and could be doing much better in both the mom and wife department. I am working on that; juggling both time for school and family. It's not easy but I am starting to think I am getting the hang of it all.
I am writing this because I want to remember this, and maybe encourage those who are either going through something they feel is impossible, or thinking of embarking on something they don't think they can do. I am sitting here in my piles of homework and laundry and telling you YOU CAN DO IT! I truly think that if I had known beforehand how hard this summers courses were going to be, I don't think I would've done it. I think I would've taken time off and taken a year longer to finish school, even though that would've stunk too. So in that regard, I am so grateful and thankful that I didn't know what I was getting myself into. And I think thats how it is with all the hard things in our lives...we don't know how hard it's going to be so we do it anyways and realize if we would've known how difficult it would be before we maybe would've thought twice first.

I am so grateful for this time in my life, as hard as I am making it for myself. I am grateful I am able to do all these things, and push myself  to limits I never thought I could both mentally and emotionally. As hard as it is, I like feeling myself stretch a little bit. I like feeling like I am accomplishing more then I thought I could handle, all at the same time. I am by no means perfect at it, but just being able to keep above water is making me a little thrilled. And I know it will come to an end, and I will look back and be so happy I did it, and be a little in awe I juggled all of this and somehow managed to survive.