We Love Football!!!

It was one of the most fun weekends we've had here last weekend! On Friday we headed into Honolulu to shop and see a movie. The girls headed in a little earlier than the boys to make sure we had plenty of time to shop without hearing them complain about it. Afterwards we met up with them to get into the Halloween spirit by seeing the new movie Paranormal Activity. If you know me at all you know that one of my biggest fears is scary movies, so how I ended up here I honestly don't know. It is the scariest movie that I have ever seen. Poor Garrett had to sit next to me and deal with me jumping, hitting, and grabbing him constantly. To my surprise and everyone else's, I made it out alive, just a little shaken up. It definitely brought the Halloween spirit we were going for!On Saturday we decided to do something different than our usual Waimea Bay day. We found out that the University of Hawaii was playing Boise State, so me, Lohren, Kelsey, Garrett, and Egan headed to the Aloha Stadium to try to get tickets for the game. Luckily, we were able to get

tickets, not the best seats but we didn't care, we just wanted to see a football game! It turned out to be a horrible game, we got killed 54-9, but we stayed until the bitter end and had a blast!

We got home around 10:30, dropped the boys off at their dorm and than us girls decided to go out and have a little more fun. We ended up driving around, jamming out to music, with Lohren's

camera video taping us! It was been one of my favorite memories here so far!

Surfin' USA

Last week I finally attempted at my dream of surfing! It was quite the experience. I went with Landon Smart who is also a beginner so right off the bat we knew it would be interesting. We headed down to Turtle Bay, jumped in the water and started paddling. After losing my balance and falling off the bored while not even moving, I started to get the hang of it. Paddling is a workout! I was getting thrashed and thrown all over the place, but luckily I was laughing through the entire process. After paddling for a good half hour, Landon told me to turn around and try to catch some waves. The next thing I know he is yelling at me to paddle as fast as I can and then stand up. Let me tell you, it is much easier said than done! At one point, I wasn't even trying to catch the wave and all of the sudden I was swept up and being carried in by the wave. I was cruising! I was on my stomach, holding on to the board for dear life, screaming and laughing my head off. I turn to find Landon laughing hysterically at me, telling me to stand up, which there was absolutely no way I was going to do that! We started paddling in after that and had to go up on this reef to get to the beach, I got a little cut up on my leg, making me feel like a true hard core surfer! I'll get there by the end of the year! Practice makes perfect!

Later that day, we went back out to the beach with Garrett, Egan and their surf boards. I was glad I had chosen to go earlier that day than with them. Also beginners, they went out having no clue what they were getting themselves into. As the girls took a nice nap in the sun, they boys were out trying to stay alive on their surf boards! There had been a really bad current pulling them out and all the locals were just staring at them! I definitely had more progress than they did!

Visitors in Laie

This past week was so much fun for Lohren and I because we had some friends from back home come visit for fall break! Stephanie, Nick, Muli, and Tanner were our guests for a whole week and we packed it with as much fun tourism things as possible!! We showed them our
favorite beach Waimea a couple times the waves got pretty big! We went into Honolulu and shopped till we dropped at the Ala Moana mall (but the girls could've kept going for hours!). It was great to have them for Lohren and I because we were finally able to get food outside of the cafeteria! From Pizza Bob's to the famous Ted's Bakery, it was an enjoyable week! We were so lucky and grateful that some of our friends came all the way over here to visit us!

Unfortunately, our classes were not put on hold with our friends coming to town. School is beginning to get harder with tests, quizzes, and projects being assigned for every class.

We are staying on top of our studies while still finding PLENTY of time for the beach and other island adventures! I went with some new

people and Sadie to Waimea Bay new people and Sadie to Waimea Bay, where we watched the gorgeous sunset and then went to Ted's for a cookie treat!

A big group of students went to the new movie Where The Wild Things Are in our little theater next door to campus. I am surprised I stayed awake after waking up at 5:30 am to take my friends to the airport, but I made it through! It was a great movie, a tear jerker near the end but we loved it.

There was an event called Food Fest at campus on Saturday night.

It felt like the entire island had come out to participate. There was food from all the different

BYUH cultural clubs and a benefit concert to raise money for the countries affected in the natural disasters. It was so much fun to experience a real Hawaiian event like that right on campus!

For now, life in paradise is still life in paradise! It just keeps getting better!

Happy Birthday Kacey!

It was Kacey's birthday today, the big 20 and she got to celebrate it all the way over in London! It doesn't get better than that!

We had an eventful past weekend and besides the weather being cloudy and rainy, we made the most of it. Friday night there was a competition called So You Think You Can Sing, where other students were the contestants. They did a Michael Jackson tribute, and thanks to Daniel, I knew every word to every song (only because they were the top 10 hits)! My neighbor Megen sang Thriller and it was amazing!!

Saturday we woke up toanother cloudy/windy day here in Laie but that didn't stop us from

going to our favorite beach, waimea bay! We cliff jumped off a 25-30 foot cliff, with the boys showing off doing back

flips and the girls sticking to

screaming the entire way down.

Lohren and I also practiced our

handstands, and got pretty dang good at them, or at least we thought so! We tanned, explored, enjoyed watching the waves and then getting wiped out by the waves! Once it began to start raining pretty hard

we called it quits for the day and headed back home. We couldn't bare thinking of going back to the cafeteria food, so instead we stopped by an amazing burger

joint called Ted's Bakery and indulged the taste of real delicious food! Once we got back, it was another night of sitting on the

beach with our feet in the ocean!

Since it is October, Lohren and I had to make sure to celebrate the upcoming holiday, even though we don't have the changing leaves, cooler weather, and a new season to tell us, that yes it is actually fall! Our wonderful, thoughtful mothers each sent us packages full of decorations and treats. We are more than ready for Halloween!

Life in Laie

After a tearful goodbye to the parents, it was time to start living the college life! That night we were able to go to the PCC and see the brand new night show, "Ha, the breath of life". It was amazing! It went to different places around the world and
showed a little bit of their culture. From right here in Hawaii to Figi to Samoa, we saw all different types of dancing and heard a variety in music, but it all followed the same story line. The fire dancers were definitely the highlight of the show, it was incredible what they could do!Classes began the next day, it was a little scary to walk into a classroom and not know anybody, but everyone is so friendly here, you make friends fast. My teachers are all from different places, New Zealand, Samoa, Hawaii, Tonga, and Asia. Each class begins with a prayer, many students choose to say the prayer in their native language which has been very interesting. Believe it or not we are actually studying and getting our homework done!

Here in the tropics the weather has proved to be even more unpredictable than Utah! It can go from cloudy to burning heat to rain in a matter of minutes! But we don't let the weather

bother us to much. We have been to the beach almost everyday whether it's for an hour or five. We can jump on our beach cruisers and ride

just a few minutes down the road to Hukilau and then on Saturdays we venture a little farther to Weimea or Sunset beach. Last Saturday we spent five hours at Waimea and then went to a little town called Haleiwa for dinner, snow cones, and surfing supplies for the boys. Everyday has proved to be a new

adventure, it just keeps getting better!

Departing the SLC

Our wonderful girlfriends wouldn't let us leave the SLC without a going away party at Kate Brady's house. It was over Labor Day which was perfect because we had people home from BYU and Dixie. Maile Richardson became my personal photographer for the night and captured some great moments. Although there were other things going on that night with our friends all being new pledges, it was nice to all be together even if it was for a short time. We had such a great time eating, watching football, and socializing with everyone! It was the perfect send-off!

Aloha Hawaii! Moving into our wonderful abode

We knew to except a small and shabby dorm room, but what we got was much much smaller. When we first walked in our room, we had a moment where our hearts began to race as we saw just what we were dealing with. All metal, clunky furniture. Two closets, two desks, two beds, and two nightstands, all painted a nice berry pink (that we are slowly getting use to). We put the two men we had, my dad and Walker Jensen, to work immediately in redesigning the placement of furniture. After a couple tries we got it to a point where we could actually move around, more or less, without bumping into each other.

After that, it was off to Honolulu to shop for everything under the sun to make our room become our home. It was the Schneider

and Merrill clan plus Walker Jensen and another fellow Utahn, Landon Smart. After 8 long hours, we had made it to Target, Walmart, Sears, Best Buy, and CPK for a nice lunch break, we were set.

It then took us the next 3 days, to set everything up and unpack our multiple suitcases, but don't worry we made sure to get some beach and pool time in at the Hotel. After using every ounce of storage space, every drawer and shelf given to us, we were moved in and excited to start our adventure!