I live about five minutes away from the library, and for the last 8 months if I'm not fulfilling my adulthood responsibilities the library is where you can usually find me.

One of my favorite things about going to the library (beside the books, of course) is all the classic movies you can find downstairs. Gene Kelley, Jimmy Stewart, the dancing, the singing, Grace Kelley and her dresses, scary movies that aren't so scary... these films have a charm that you just can't find nowadays.

So because this last week I've been sick and in bed missing most of the beautiful weather we've been having lately, the only thing that could help pass the time was getting Max to rent a few of my favorite movies. There is just something about old and old fashioned that I can never resist! I feel like I've found buried treasure when I discover a new movie and am whisked away by their singing and dancing, asking myself for the millllllionth time why wasn't I born back then?

Below are a few of my personal recommendations, most I'm sure you've heard of (or seen) before. They're totally worth watching at least once!

An Affair to Remember

Meet Me in St. Louis
White Christmas

Gone With the Wind

Singin' in the Rain

To Catch a Thief
Sabrina

Rear Window

Cape Fear
Wait Until Dark

The Sound of Music
Roman Holiday

To Kill a Mockingbird
The Philadelphia Story
It's A Wonderful Life

And if you have any recommendations let me know!

love and stuff.

My attempt at writing this post within the last thirty minutes has proven to me that there is no way to write what I want to write without sounding as 7up girl cheesy as possible... So I'll carry on with it anyway, because it's turning into a fact that my tragically sappy side comes out when it comes to love and stuff.

And after the last month of life, phone calls, engagements, and celebrations, it is safe to say my friends are in love. 

But these aren't any two friends. Nope. Not at all. These two friends are who I considered best friends, who I spent entire summers with, and who I have known years before those summers. I spent most of my college life with their numbers most frequently dialed in my phone, and most certainly visited Cafe West with them enough to keep the hospital in business for another year. 

And because life isn't perfect, nor anywhere near predictable, there was a time they had both loved and lost and decided to move on. So thanks to the spring of 2011, memory lane includes the three of us eating the most disgusting chocolate chip rice krispy treat brownies you have ever tasted, listening to Ke$ha sing about love being blind, and trying to forget he/she who must not be named. I have a love/hate relationship with this time in life, hate because we were "sick" as little Wes would say, and love because it was just "another clever twist" as Kylie would say. Kind of like a right-of-passage that I'm so glad I never missed.

It's worth a post to congratulate these two best friends who were convinced at one time that "love was evil spelled backwards" because they are both now engaged, both getting married this June, and both within three days of each other! Kylie and Wes I love you both to death... maybe not as much as your significant others, but to death nevertheless.

springtime time.

more from ee cummings,
because i like him so much


who are you, little i
(five or six years old)
peering from some high

window; at the gold
of sunset

(and feeling: that if day
has to become night

this is a beautiful way) 


--

other ee cummings poems shared here, here, here, here and here.
yes, they're all that good.

what i learned today in high school.

Never in a million years would I have ever thought that I'd finish up college only to return to high school. Not ever. And it's not that I didn't love high school when I was younger, but working with high school students at this age has proven to be quite the experience. I feel like I will have stories worth telling for the rest of my life! I'm not kidding when I say it kind of feels like being a part of an audience in a live reality soap opera ... kind of.

The TA's are usually my favorites (I don't care what people say, you will always have favorites) but there is one who I absolutely adore. We'll call him Chase. Chase is just about the sweetest kid on the planet, and walks in every morning with a big smile on his face always asking, "What can I do for you today?" I texted Max this morning and told him if Chase ever need to be adopted into a family (he's not an orphan, but lets just say he was) we would definitely be the first parents in line!

Anyway, today I needed help sorting through papers, and as I was asking some of the students about prom, which is coming up in a couple of weeks, I noticed that when Chase mentioned the girl he had asked, some of the other students looked surprised. In fact, one student even asked, "Why on earth would you take her? She's so weird." Another chimed in agreeing. Chase kept sorting through papers, and shrugged his shoulders responding, "Because. I think she needs a friend."

I don't know who this girl is, but boy was I impressed. It reminded me of a piece of advice I was given a long time ago, "Three things in human life are important: The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind."

what matters the most.

What matters the most is what lasts the longest.
-Elder M. Russell Ballard

I have so been looking forward to a weekend entirely devoted to the two most important things in life: my family and my faith in so many, many things.

The gospel has brought so much joy in my life and in the lives around me, I can't think of any day more joyful than the day I got married. But the older I've grown, at least over the last year or so, I have become so much more acutely aware of the peace the gospel brings too.

Today as I watched the morning and afternoon sessions of the LDS General Conference, I was particularly impressed when I was reminded of what the Savior taught in the scriptures: "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." (John 14:27)

"These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." (John 16:33)

I remember an experience I had during my first semester of college. My first day of college, actually. I was a newly-18-years old freshman, not knowing a single soul on that small campus all the way out on the north shore of Hawaii. I remember realizing as I sat in my dorm room and looked around, how awfully alone I felt. I was scared and uncertain and honestly, afraid. I look back and remember realizing that the only thing I could do (beside call my parents for the tenth time) was to pray. So I knelt down in prayer next to my small bed, and began to talk with my Heavenly Father. I don't even remember what I asked for or what I said, and it didn't change the fact that I was by myself or that my family and friends were still thousands of miles away, but I will never forget the way I felt. I knew as well as I knew anything else that at that moment my prayers were being heard. I had a Heavenly Father who was watchful of me, who loved me, who was just as aware of my prayer and my hopes and my worries as I was. Not everything was immediately solved or changed during that time on my knees, but the way I had felt was. I felt loved and I felt at peace, and knowing that I was going to be okay was enough.

I share that experience only to explain the way the gospel felt for me lately, today as I watched conference, whenever I hear discouraging news on the television or between family and friends, or even when I simply wake up on the wrong side of the bed. I have always been grateful of the joy the gospel brings, but am now so grateful for the peace I can always feel too.

simplifying.

I've always been back and forth with Facebook, but have had an Instagram, Pinterest, Blogging account for a long time. My sister recently told me about Tinder... which is past my time at this point, but to be completely honest with you, we think its awful. Anyway, after one long talk with my Grandma a couple weeks ago I decided to forego all of social media for a little while, which is why over the last month [or two] I haven't been on my blog as much either.

There are pros and cons to what all of the above has to offer, but I'd be lying if I said that taking a break from all of it wasn't great... because it was. It might all just be in my head, but I honestly felt like I actually had more time in my day to read, spend time with people I care about, think about things worth thinking about, and so on. I had started to notice that over the last little while whenever I had a free minute or two I would usually grab my phone and check my readers, news feed, etc -- and I got so annoyed with myself for being one of those people who knows whats going on with people I don't even know (or pinning recipes I know I'll never try!) or even worse, doing both of these things while I was with other people.

Rant over. But whether you love or hate social media, I'd highly recommend taking a break every now and then. It's nice not knowing or pinning or posting every once in a while.

image via