Still more rambling

This is going to be a bit of a ramble-y post, detailing some of the things that have been happening and going through my head recently.
For starters, I am beginning to realize that stalking is much more of a commonality in the media than I had previously thought. For example: Twilight, The Phantom of the Opera, and this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_ILDFp5DGA are all prime examples of that. *insert disturbed noises and shuddering right here* Much as I may love the first two, the fact remains: STALKERS!
Next topic of randomosity: My kiniseology (the study of muscles and movement) class is AMAZING! And it is really challenging, too. In the course of the next 8 weeks, I will learn 500+ muscles, as well as their function, origins, and insertions. But it’s fantastically interesting, and I look forward to it every week. However, Clinical Massage is my heart-baby. I LOVE massage therapy. And the more I learn about it, the more I love it. Each time we learn new techniques or routines, I think about how to customize it for the various people I know. For instance, someone who is 5”2’ and built like a toothpick is probably going to want lighter pressure and different strokes than a 6”5’ construction worker. I love how each massage is as unique as the people involved in giving and receiving it. I love the inherant trust that as a massage therapist, people give to me. I try to live my entire life, not just the time that I am in class, as a person who deserves that trust. The more I learn, the more I want to continue learning and the more I want to be a better person so I can contribute to society as a whole.
Lastly, it has been brought home to me that life is meant to be lived IN the moment, and regardless of what the future holds, enjoy what you have when you have it! As of a year ago, I would have been crushed and bewildered had I known where I am today. I don’t know where I will be in a year, but that is ok. I will enjoy where I am right now, and deal with tomorrow when it happens.

Rachael's Recipes and More!

Hot diggety dog, peeps! I wasn’t going to make another recipe post this soon, but fun things have happened. One is blackberry lemonade, one is Mistborn, and one is Caro Emerald. What are these wonders, you ask? All in good time, my friends.

Blackberry lemonade
Make a simple syrup out of equal parts sugar and lemon juice (for example, ½ C. sugar to ½ C. juice)
Add an equal (another ½ C.) amount of berry juice (I buy bags of mixed berries from Aldi for about $2.50, thaw in the microwave, and strain the pulp until I get enough juice for whatever I need)
I also added the juice of one orange, but you don’t have to. To serve, chill the syrup and dilute to taste. It’s very cool if you add two or three frozen berries to garnish, and it tastes oh so yummy!

Next awesome thing: Mistborn. This is the first book of a trilogy by Brandon Sanderson, professor of creative writing at Brigham Young University. I read Mistborn, and was promptly sucked into a very absorbing world with human, believable characters and many and varied plot twists. If you like books that make you gasp, put your hands over your eyes, and stay up way too late reading, FIND THESE BOOKS! They are worth the effort to follow all the intricacies. I have started the second one (The Well of Ascension) and can hardly put it down.

And then last but certainly not least: Caro Emerald. First and foremost, know this: I do not like 99.9% of jazz. But I LOVE this singer! I was introduced to her awesomeness yesterday morning, and have listened to most of her songs that Youtube has up. Multiple times. Every day. She is SO GOOD! Just so you don’t have to take the time to look her up, here you go: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74LXx0wSqMI&playnext_from=TL&videos=SRGxTkknNZQ I would not suggest watching the video if immodesty bothers you (shots in a swimming pool and the like), but the song is fabbity fab fab on many different levels. I love finding random things that bring me joy. I owe the last two to my favoritest Robzilla, so here is credit to the maestro of randomness.

Rachael's Recipes

You know how I talk about food all the time? Thanks to my executive decision, I will now start posting some of my favorite foods under the tagline “Rachael’s Recipes” (catchy, isn’t it?) Without further ado, I give you “Crack Cookies” (disclaimer: no illegal ingredients are used in these cookies; you just think there are, because you CAN’T STOP EATING THEM!)

¾ C. butter or margarine
2 TBS to ½ C peanut butter (according to preference)
1 ¾ C flour
1 C packed brown sugar
½ C white sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla
Cloves and cinnamon to taste (optional)
2 C rolled oats
½ package each: butterscotch ships, chocolate chips, M&Ms

Cream butter. Add sugar, half of flour, and mix. Add all ingredients except for chips and oatmeal. Beat together, add remaining ingredients. Bake at 375 10-15 minutes. Enjoy!

Unexpected

I have been thinking about two things a great deal lately: Life is wildly unexpected, and God looks out for us ALWAYS. Even when we are doing our best to make it on our own, a loving Heavenly Father is ready at any moment to catch us when we look up and say “Please? I have no idea what to do!”
If you had told me four months ago (the first week after V broke up with me) that I would not only be completely healed from that experience, but also just starting a relationship with someone I barely even knew at that point, I would have scowled at you and said that nothing was going to happen between myself and guys until after my mission (3 years in the future). Yet here I am, in that position. After moving through the stages of grief (some of them multiple times) and then throughout the phases of healing, I realized that I am whole again. The power of the Atonement took away a heartache I thought would take me many months to recover from.
This new relationship is very different from the last one I had. They are both good men, and I am incredibly grateful that I have had them both in my life. I have learned SO much! My first relationship (with V) was exactly what I needed at that point in my life. I grew immensely because of it, and I found out more of what I do and do not want as I look for an eternal companion. Heavenly Father watched over me through that experience, the breakup, recovery, and now my blossoming relationship with M.
M has been completely unexpected. We met a week before my breakup, got to know each other a little bit in January and February, and by the first week in March had full-blown hardcore crushes on each other. I FREAKED OUT. I like things to move slowly, and this certainly didn’t. I tried to put the brakes on, and that didn’t work. I got an answer to prayer, essentially in the form of “Calm down. This is a good experience you need to have. M is a good, worthy man. Enjoy it!” So I have. And I fell hard and fast for him. We mesh on some of the craziest, most bizarre levels. Like both being born at home and homeschooled all the way through to college. Or not wanting a TV when we find our respective own places. The list really goes on and on, but I won’t. We also mesh on the more basic, essential levels, like religion, goals, and respect. Basically, we make each other happy. It’s a wonderful thing. Life may go FOOMP in the near future (it usually does!), but that is no reason not to enjoy the moment. Life is unexpected, but God always has our best interests at heart.

Weddings!

My weekend can pretty much be summed up with the word “weddings.” LOTS of weddings. I was a backstage person, guest, planner, and strawboss in the course of 36 hours. I was able to help set up and decorate for H&B’s reception on Saturday morning. Then I was a guest at L&B’s reception. Then a guest/punch bowl attendant/tear down person at H&B’s. Sunday afternoon, I helped plan a wedding reception for M&J, where I was promoted to strawboss (wedding speak for the person in charge behind the scenes, so the bride is not all stressed out about centerpieces and other unimportant details). It will be the second wedding I have been “in charge” of, and the seventh or eighth I have helped with. Weddings run big in my family, with more than 25 years of accumulated knowledge and experience. You need wedding know-how? I gots connections.

Musings on food

Food is incredibly important to me. Not just to keep me alive, but to make it more worthwhile. I love being a good cook (there is a time for modesty in talent, and now is not it) because it makes other people happy. It is fun to cook for yourself, and find out what sorts of tastes and textures you prefer, but it is more fun to make someone else’s favorite dish and watch their eyes light up. I have fond memories of making chocolate chip cookies with a dear friend and watching him eat half the dough while we talked with a batch in the oven. Happiness and people are synonymous with food in my life. No celebration is complete without comestibles! Birthday cakes of various types of awesome (including, but not limited to: beach party scenes, castle sieges, sea monsters, and one particularly memorable pangolin), Dad’s mashed potatoes, apple pie for breakfast the day after Thanksgiving, and the first tomatoes out of the summer garden. Different, but all carrying some kind of wonderful memory.

Rambling about life

I realize that everyone is busy. The craziness in my life is no less or more important than anyone elses. It just happens to be what I am closest to. One of my common phrases is “My life just went Foomp!” This is what I use to describe those times when you have just gotten used to life as it is, and something new and crazy comes up. Case in point: I was called to be in my branch Relief Society presidency almost two months ago. This came one month after I started a new and crazy quarter at school, and two months after the breakup I was still healing from. I still have the “Foomp!” feeling. A lot of that has to do with my age; I feel like 20 means that I am still a little girl masquerading as a responsible adult. However, I know that I wouldn’t be here if that wasn’t where I needed to be right now. Isn’t that why we have experiences like this? To help us grow? Sometimes I feel like I could SEE myself growing and changing, like you can almost watch teenage boys grow out of their clothes overnight. When I think that it has been almost two years since I moved to Indy, I am amazed. In the last year alone, I have been through experiences ranging from incredible to stressful in the extreme. Life as normal, I suppose.