This Is RubyAlMe

Hello world!

This was a bit of an eventful week, and I'm not really sure where to start. I guess I'll begin with that everything's being packed away.

It's always weird to watch everything disappear a little at a time. The house becomes empty yet messy at the same time. It makes you realize just how much you own and wonder why you ever let yourself accumulate all of that stuff... *tick mark*

And that's not the sad part, just the annoying part. No, the sad is telling everyone you're going. And for a lot of people they had literally no idea until the last minute.

I gave Coatrack a huge hug along with a few other closer friends in my last days. One was a friend that I don't think I ever gave a nickname... But he looks kinda like Carter from The Kane Chronicles, so I'll call him that. I knew I was definitely friends with him, but we didn't really hang out as much during classes or lunch or anything, it was more like every once in a while. So I was surprised and a bit saddened that when we later texted he told me how sad he is that I'm going and that he already misses me. *tearful pout* Sweetieee, Y U DO DIS TO MEH?!

For the majority of Thursday and Friday, my dad was out on an interview in Utah, so Mom and I were by ourselves to get some packing done. And... it brought back some nice memories.

We were on our own without my dad and sis for the last weeks of Alabama, and we were on our own for the road trip aaaaall the way to the other side of the country. We learned a lot and grew closer during that time when we only had each other. It was also nice to find out that we could make it on our own if me and my mom had to be together for some reason or another in the future.

So yeah. It reminded me of our last moments in the South, though this time certainly didn't last as long.

I feel so bad, though, that I wasn't as useful as I always wish I could be, but- especially on Friday- I kept distracting myself. There hadn't really been anything to do on FFN that day, and so I decided to go look at a bit of Tumblr... and I was sucked in for eternity. Seriously, I had downloaded and screenshoted- if I was counting correctly- over 80 pics related to FMA within that day, plus a small amount (like 6?) of screenshots for non-FMA material. Plus I got about 24 more yesterday, I think. So I've seriously gotta be careful about Tumblr, oh my gosh.

At least a good thing about this trip through FMA Tumblr is that I managed to not see those inappropriate things that I sometimes ran into by accident that made me regret everything. The closest was tags for yaoi ships, but nothing was even really happening in the pic besides the two standing closer to each other than they would in canon, practically. Wow, I am SO glad I didn't see... Blegh.

Anyway... Yeah. I was quite sucked in Tumblrland and it was so hard to get out of it. I never really did (even when the missionaries came to start loading up boxes) until at the end of the day, when my dad came back and we went out to eat. (Turns out the Pad Thai at that restaurant was a lot spicier than I remembered.) Tumblr is very addicting, kids.

Ugh... Oh dear. So I'd planned to email more of my Graphic Design stuff to myself, but I forgot to in the end until it was too late. So one thing I may not actually get to show you guys- unless in the future we own a computer that isn't just my dad's that has Photoshop and I can download the .jpeg version of the file out of that- and the other I'll have to take pics of.

So, one thing we did is that at the end of the semester, he let us make designs to iron onto a shirt. I hadn't been entirely sure what to make, but then I remembered my Wattpad profile pic. So, I put my Wattpad profile pic onto a shirt.

You like??? *wink*

It's at the bottom corner of the shirt, so that when I use this shirt underneath others the design won't show, but I can still wear it by itself if I wanted to! Yay clever!

There's another one (dang it, I really wish I emailed the original version to myself!) that I made when we were making logos. I decided to make it so that one way it could be read as "FMA" but the other way as "WFAM" (cuz, you know, gotta start advertising for a story that isn't even actually written yet) plus give it kinda the feel of a transmutation circle. This is the one that's ready to be ironed onto something if I ever decide to actually do that:

Above is the trial run, below us that actual iron-on paper. So on a shirt or whatever the letters would be reversed (of course) and it'd look all cool.

Since I don't wanna wait any longer in sharing this, KYAAA~ look at what a fellow author drew for me!

At the end of Commader Zucchini's last chapter for her awesome Modern AU fic, she said "review and Al will have an autographed drawing of a cat for you". And then she decided to make that a reality.

I was the first to review and at the end I'd been like "Gimme dat kitteh, Al!" or something like that, but I hadn't thought something would come out of that! And Commander Zucchini was so cool that she followed through!

I might be overreacting, but it was just such an awesome surprise and it reminds me again of just how great fanfic writers can be. They're so nice and adorable and we all basically become friends with each other because we all review to each other and sometimes even do more than that, like send fanart to each other and stuff like that. Doesn't that sound like a great community? It's one of the reasons why I like FFN- or at least my little corner of it, with all the other FMA lovers and a few other random fandoms I dabble in. Sometimes the fandom feels a bit dead, but these awesome people are actually keeping it going, and new people join in all the time. And my trip through FMA Tumblr reminded me that the fandom really as dead as I'd thought. Sooo many people are a part of it and are as obsessed as me!

I actually found out on Facebook a few days ago about a site called HitRecord that also seems like a cool community, on where everyone inspires each other and pushes each other to keep creating. I'm surprised I haven't heard of it before, but oh well. I was thinking maybe once we're all settled down then I'll consider joining that website too. Hopefully, at that point I'll get to focus more on writing and doodling and stuff like that. I don't wanna leave FFN, but this new site could also be a good opportunity. We'll see what happens.

I was gonna talk a bit more about the new collab fic, but Liz is waiting for me to write some more on it (apparently, she forgot that I mentioned not wanting to do fic stuff on Sunday, but I guess there isn't really any harm in writing a bit more in ours since neither of us are comfortable with much swearing and romantic stuff. Hopefully, the battle scene will be left for tommorow). Therefore, I'll just mention that last night I learned a pair of American girls had created a new Vocaloid named Ruby a few months ago, and she's used for English songs (though I guess she wouldn't sound too bad in Japanese, either). I listened to a few covers people have already used her for, and she's definitely interesting to listen to. It's just the first version of her so some things need tweaking in fluidity- she has a lot of lilts while singing, and it actually makes me thinking of Irish singers even though she's American) but otherwise I like her. I hope she starts becoming popular. Maybe someday she'll actually have her own PVs and hologram concerts and stuff one day...

I tried to explain to my dad what Vocaloid is. He was unimpressed. (He called it "cheating".)

That's all for now! Bai!

Old and New Projects

Hello world!

Since the semester's almost over, I'm starting to take the projects from Graphic Design that I actually like and putting them in my email so I can keep them. Here are two such examples:

Wanna know the best part? Neither of these were actual projects, I just whipped them up when I was done with the lesson and was therefore bored. The first is the first part of "Misguided Ghosts", with a small, poopy doodle of Dipper's hat. The second I actually made in the last class. I just wanted to try out just making whatever in Illustrator (cuz it's the closest to drawin digitally I can get at the moment and I haven't really tried drawing digitally), and it came out like that. I actually really like it- it's not really my usual style (if drawing Al heads counts as a style), but has some cute parts. I sure hope my lazy attempt at arms doesn't make her look like she has tentacles... unless this is supposed to be a part-octopus girl. Then that is acceptable.

I have one or two others that I plan to send to myself, so I guess I'll have those next week.

And here's the thing I was all excited about because I was gonna finish it this week!

Yes. It is a doll in a pot with an eggplant on her head. With our kitchen in the background.

This is pretty much what I've spent most of my time in Ceramics doing. It's supposed to be three different objects stacked on top of each other... And, well, I think I accomplished that. And mine was different from everyone else's, so yay! People in general really liked it, I think.

I hadn't really thought a piece of art could describe the artist and his/her personality... But I have to say this one actually does a pretty good job of showing mine. I mean, there's the girlyness and cuteness and colorfulness, but then also a bit of tomboy (in the green striped pot, I'd say) and creepy from the eyes. People were already slightly creeped out by the eyes before it got fired... And I have to admit it really didn't help when I first tried painting them black first. I ended up putting dark blue over it to hopefully tone the creep down a notch. But people say it's still there, and I'm totally okay with that.

This is one of the projects I'm most proud of that I've ever done (though I would've taken even longer to paint it so it really looked nice if my teacher hadn't seemed impatient with me), so I really wanna take it while we move, but... Well, it's fragile, as you can imagine. So it's in a bag wrapped up and surrounded by stuffed animals. We hope that's enough for it to survive.

I wish my new phone could take pics that were as cool and dramatic as my old phone... That was one thing I liked about my old one.

This week, one of the other wards invited us to watch the newest Face-to-Face live (which had one of the new apostles, the YW General President, and another important leader) with them. This ward was the one that had the two girls I saw in my first activity in this state, officially met in Youth Conference, and later hung out a little bit during girl's camp (*insert their camp names*). They're the first young women I've told that I'm going, since I felt pretty dang sure this activity was to be the last time I'd see them. It'd be really surprising if I did see them somewhere else before we go.

Anyway, we missed some of the first part because everything was being set up, but there were a few messages that stuck out to me.

One: a question someone gave was about being nervous to raise kids in this sucky world. I've already had that concern for a while, and I remember discussing that topic with Blondie last year. She was also concerned for her little brother, who in just a few years would enter high school. Squirt is just such a cute and innocent little dude, and I had to admit I was scared for him, too.

But just as Sister Oscarson was about to give her answer, a sudden thought popped into my head.

If you've watched General Conference somewhere within the past few years, then you've most likely heard at least one or two people say that we young people have harder trials than anyone before us, but we were meant to be here on Earth at this time and we would surely be able to overcome the world.

The memory of having heard that came in, along with "Surely, the next generation will be even stronger."

Basically, if we live in a bad world now but are supposed to be able to be spiritually strong enough to be happy, then if the world worsens in the future (which I know it will), the newest generation then will be able to be spiritually stronger than us, the previous generation. If they were taught the right things and had a home and family based around Christ and love (which is a suggestion Sis. Oscarson gave), then they'd be able to take on anything, right?

That really comforted me, and I shared what the Holy Ghost had told me to the YW secretary later, because she has a baby right now and he's just the cutest little thing ever (and he reminds me of a monkey in a good way). She really liked the thought, too, of the next generation (her baby) being stronger than ours.

Two: The elders in the Face-to-Face gave some suggestions for preparing for a mission that I hadn't heard before. One of them was to get a job, because it would teach you responsibility, getting along with coworkers, and learning how to work out solutions for problems. I had to admit that wasn't that bad of an idea. I may very well be getting a job in the summer (we really can't know if I will, though, until we settle in somewhere), and this makes me realize it'd help me even more beyond just gaining some money. I wonder what kind of job I'd actually be willing to get, though, and could qualify for...

Another was to learn to love the Lord, because once you loved Him, then, obviously, you'd have the desire to serve and love others.

I think that's all for that. (I haven't bothered to look at the notes I took, so...) NEXT!

Ah, jeez, this is my next topic? *sad face*

K, so, I've barely told anyone I'm going, since I'd rather wait until the last day I can tell them so they spend less time being sad. But one person I have told is... Coatrack.

He looked so shocked and like he was really hoping I was just kidding, but... I mean, some people do say they're moving as a joke, but I'm not one of them. Poor guy, just like Broranges and The 1 and The 2... they all were or are heartbroken! And this time I can actually empathize with him, which makes me feel worse!

I told him earlier because he's currently my only friend I actually hang out with outside of school, and I feel closer to him than I have with pretty much anyone in a long time. As far as I can remember, he's the third person that I've had the experience of laying lazily and saying stupid jokes and feeling like I'm drunk off tiredness (though I wasn't even sleepy), the first being my sis and the second being Beka (and even then it hadn't ever really happened until two Winter Breaks ago). I'm really unsure of what to make of our relationship... But, well, whatever it is, it won't be able to stay the same since I'm leaving.

So many times already, one of the last lines in the song I wrote comes to me when I think about Coatrack... "Sorry I'm going, but that's what happens when you know me..."

We got the chance to hang out yesterday (though, since I had some other things I needed to do at home, I didn't stay at his house for quite as long as other times). We finished The Devil is a Part-Timer!, played a game, sang some songs, stuff like that. And, near the end of the visit, I managed to convince myself to give him the little Book of Mormon I had promised to myself I'd give to him. Just a few weeks ago I'd felt so sure about giving it to him, but right there in the moment I had a really hard time getting myself to again feel like it was a good idea. But I did it... And I blurted out a whole spiel that hopefully had some sort of meaning to him... Like I expected, he wasn't exactly very thrilled about what I was giving him, but by the time I was near to tears in nervousness and stuff, I think he figured out what this meant to me.

I wonder if he'll not only get himself to read a bit of it, but actually feel the Spirit and realize the book is true. It'd make me really happy if that happened.

We're hoping we can get a final time to hang out, but if it turns out we can't, I think this was still a good last hangout.

Last thing. There's a girl in the FFN group I'm friends with who goes by Liz. She's usually one of the ones who loves writing or at least helping to write fics with the others. The girl she'd been writing with has been super busy or has no inspiration or something, but so they haven't gotten to add more to their own story yet. And since she is itching to type something, she decided to ask me if I wanted to collab with her for a new fic.

It had been unexpected, and perhaps not super-smart considering how busy we are with packing things up, I said yes anyways. So far we still have a lot to work out, but I've started writing the first chapter, and it's already been really fun.

The thing is that it's been so long since I've written something all about the canon FMA characters. FH and VH are pure OCs besides two extra things at the end of two of the chapters. Ever. And the most recent one-shots I wrote that had dialogue was "Microscopic" and "Rush", which only had a few lines from Ed. In my own time I occasionally write Ed and Al with some version of me, but it's not canon material. It's not them in their original world with the other characters.

So, yeah. It's been a long time.

But this new story (that remains without a real title so far) will have at least 7 characters talking at some point, and is centered around 5 canon characters. And even though she wanted an AU (I managed to come up with how the AU happened, and it's a solution I don't think I've ever seen a writer think of before! *score*), in general the canon universe is the same and that's where the story starts. Man, it's so refreshing and feels so good to write about the whole FMA cast again. Liz herself hasn't done much actual writing so far since I have a lot more expertise in FMA than her, but I'm hoping this will turn out to be more of an equal partnership once her own characters come in. She's still giving her advice and ideas and is the one leading more in creating the world we'll write about, so I think it will be more even in the end even if I do actual writing more.

Alrighty then, I think that's basically everything for now. I considered saying something about a few ideas for stories, but I think I'll wait to see if they actually develop into something before bothering to mention them.

Can You Hear Me?

Hello world!

First order of business: NIISAN IS FLIPPIN' BACK FROM HIS MISSION ASDFGHJKL

Yeperdoodles, he returned to Utah a few days ago, which makes me happy even though I wasn't physically there to greet him... Though my sister was. There's a video and pic of my sis giving him a hug for the first time in two years. It's a bit of a tear-jerker.

I know that time generally passes by fast and two years out of who knows how long my life will be is really not that much... But knowing he's done and hearing his voice and stuff is just like "Oh my gosh, I almost thought the day wouldn't come."

Apparently, the plan now is to move at the end of the month (so I have to deal with end-of-semester exams and projects anyways... *tear*), so that I can finally go to the cool school, even though technically my dad hasn't actually landed a job yet. It's really hard to determine what will happen until he gets hired by somebody.

So, today I'm wearing the tie (I was gonna on Friday, but it was Spirit Week, and I had to dress a certain way, and bringing a tie wasn't the best idea) for the final time. In the case of the 15th of every month thing, at least, I mean. I might wear it a few times in the future just for the heck of it. (I sure hope once we get to actually see Niisan, I can ask him how to tie a tie again... I kept trying some days ago, and for some reason I could only manage to tie it backwards... It's supposed to be forwards.)

Second order of ze biz: famous people died! *collective gasp*

You know David Bowie, right? Yup, him.

And then one or two days later, Alan Rickman (AKA Severus Snape AKA the villain in the first Die Hard movie). Mhm.

Both died from cancer (and, at least for Bowie, no one had known he had cancer, he was fighting it silently- and, of course, a week earlier he'd apparently released a song about being in heaven, which is clearly not a coincidence).

Okay, look at this. Because of the book Wonder, I got obsessed with "Space Oddity" a few months ago. And I'd insisted in watching Die Hard during Winter Break last month.

Why does this keep happening? It was the same with El Chavo! The moment after I'd truly come to appreciate their work (or at least one of their works), the person poofs away. I'm starting to think maybe I should just avoid watching older movies and listening to older songs so that I don't feel like it's my fault if they died...

This is Major Tom to Ground Control

I'm stepping through the door...

I'm feeling very still

And I think my spaceship knows which way to go

Tell my wife I love her very much, she knows...

Ground Control to Major Tom

Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong 

Can you hear me, Major Tom?

Can you hear me, Major Tom?...

There's nothing I can do...

I feel inclined to propose the idea of learning how to do this song with Coatrack. He might like learning the guitar for it, and I could just practice more the vocals... And, though I haven't mentioned it (or at least in a long time), I wanna finish the mashup of "Sunshine and City Lights" and "Fix You". Maybe I sing more the lyrics for the former and him the latter? We could call it "The Sunshine and City Lights Will Fix You" or a shortened version of that title. It'd be so great to figure out how to do the entire mashup well.

Ugh... So, I believe I've said something before about the projects in my Child Development class, right? There's a final project, and it's kinda hard. Mainly cuz I'm not entirely sure how to do it. And the girls in my group haven't exactly helped much. So fantastic.

I mean, I'm not entirely sure if I'm doing it right! What if I wasn't supposed to make an entire piñata? What if what I have written down for the lesson plan (which is harder than the piñata itself) is really bad? I don't remember that well what I should be writing! GAH, I should've taken a pic of the example when I had the chance!!! *Titan Eren roar* (That reminds me- I've been practicing again the raps.)

That probably didn't make much sense, but I just don't even want to go through the effort of explaining what this project is. Just know I'm not enjoying it.

Except for the paper-mâché-ing. That part's kinda fun.

Last thing, I think... I don't think I have touched on the Ishvalan!Winry idea I came up with a few weeks ago. I've seen stories where Trisha was Ishvalan, and so the Elrics are part Ishvalan... which just gets weirder since they're alchemists... and they have to go around hiding their appearance, which can't exactly be that easy without color contacts existing.

But I was thinking about this and wondering "What would happen if it wasn't Trisha that was Ishvalan?" and I suddenly thought of the Rockbells, rather than the Elrics, being Ishvalan. So, I wrote some scenes of what would happen with Sara Rockbell being from Ishval and, thus, Winry being half-Ishvalan. Things got more difficult for her than I imagined they'd be. Though I really don't know how she'd react to Scar, in that case. If I get inspired to write more for this AU, I'll try to figure that out.

I said earlier I'd try to get more prompts. One friend gave me two that were quite difficult for FMA ("Pacific"? Really? I guess I should've specified more what kinds of words I needed) and I sent a prompt to someone else- "underwear"- that I decided to try myself also. I've gotten the farthest with "underwear", but it's an idea completely unrelated with anything, so... Butt. Eh, at least I'm getting something down on paper (er, iPod/OpenOffice/Google Drive). And I'd thought of a small detail to add to WFAM. Ooh, there's something to do with WFAM that I think will be ready for next week, so I hope it comes out okay...

WAIT NOPE NOT LAST THING I was invited to a new RP forum by a guy who'd actually found my old RP forum... Wow, it feels like that'd been so long ago... After I joined the new place, I decided that after so long of avoiding I'd go look at what was in the old. I noticed some things I didn't know or didn't remember:

1. Things between Darkrai and Vibraknife were bad. I felt hurt by the stuff they were saying to each other- it wasn't even insults directed at me, and I got hit with the blow anyways. I can't believe both decided to stick around despite it; I don't know if it was just for my sake or they actually liked the forum besides their fights.

2. I was bossy and a bit of a jerk. Really, we were all kinda jerks, but I was most surprised by what I said. I like to think of myself as a nice girl... and that's kinda the general consensus, as far as I know. But in my effort to be a leader and take charge of the forum, I said things a bit harsher than I think I'd do in real life (except for the times I'm really ticked off). I was saddest to see I sometimes actually wrote something that didn't sound too nice to Darkrai, even though he was my friend! Some of it came off differently than I'm guessing I thought it sounded in my head at the time, but that kind of thing happens a lot when typed down instead of actually said. But other stuff... I don't think I would've said it out loud, but when you're on the Internet you just feel more freedom to say what you think, and that can sometimes be a bad thing. This was one of the cases of it being a bad thing. Later, I actually sent an apology to Darkrai privately, who never commented on it. I don't know if it actually meant anything to him.

3. I remember that at one point I'd given up on checking on whether people came back to the forum, because it'd suddenly had no activity or at least a week. And coming back now... I realized my friends actually did come back some point after that and tried to keep it going a leetle bit longer, even though I wasn't there... So now I feel horrible. Though, considering all of our attitudes on there, maybe it was actually for the best to stop using the forum sooner. Some fun stuff happened there, but it wasn't as sunshine and rainbows as it should've been.

Speaking of, this new forum actually has some drama, too...

I wanna try to get back into the RP game, but I've been worried for a few reasons. I haven't RPed in a long time, besides the PMs where we just do random things interacting with FMA characters. So far, all the active RPs have a complicated backstory and I'm worried I won't understand what I'm supposed to do. This ain't just being random. I haven't RPed as very many characters, and none of them seem to fit well into anything that's going on.

I kinda wanna suggest doing one of the simpler, easier RPs, but I don't know if the people at this forum will actually like it, and I don't know if the admin of the forum will be offended by me showing that I'm not into what they do and think I'm trying to make it something different to my taste and that if I don't like this forum then I should just go to one that actually has what I want and... yeah. I don't know if I should suggest or not. *nervous sweat*

ALL THE INDECISION FOR EVERYTHING! ALL THE WRITER'S BLOCK! WHYYYYYYY I'm done here.

[Addition: a friend recommended RWBY to me, and I've watched most of what's on Netflix. I don't really know how to describe it, but I will say that the fight scenes are awesome. Amazing. Seriously.]

I Don't Want More Food!

Hello world!

For the first time in a long time, I'm actually typing all of this on a keyboard... a physical keyboard, not the one on my iPod. There's a kinda nice thing about hearing the sound of fast typing, except when I think there's other people around that might be annoyed by it. Then I might try to type quietly, which is kind of a hard thing to accomplish...

Anyway, firstly I wanna point out that apparently Coatrack really did like the song (which has parts that wouldn't make to anyone other than me and him), so much so that he wants to write the guitar chords to strum while I sing it. So we worked on it a bit yesterday, among with doing other things. I still feel so bad about not exactly being the easiest person to work with if I'm supposed to be singing and they're supposed to be playing some instrument... Yeah. And the song itself is not the easiest to work with, either. I'm sorry, Coatrack! Blame my brain! *sob*

It's fun to do stuff with Coatrack and his dad, but it's also nerve-wracking cuz his dad keeps wanting to buy stuff for me, mainly food. And, well... I don't want to say I grew up believing I shouldn't expect to be able to get stuff or be given stuff from my parents, because that is untrue. I could ask my mom for some junk food or a toy if I wanted it, but I learned early in my life to think twice about whether I really want it or not, so I don't really say much that I want something because I realize I'd be fine without it, and I wouldn't want my parents to waste money on something I just sort of want. Especially because I'm also a bit of a cheapskate.

It should be a good thing, but that mentality apparently causes problems when I'm with other people that are on a mission to buy me junk. They assure me I don't need to get the cheapest thing on the menu, or I can play as many games as I want, or I can tell them to change the direction of the car if I wanna go someplace else, but I can't stop worrying about what I'm doing to their wallet! These good people are taking so much time and money out to spend it on me and I don't feel very comfortable about that! Ugh. Rant over.

It was the first week back to school after Winter Break, but it actually snowed later on Sunday (not much, mind you), and so Monday was canceled.

We had a snow day.

May I say having one of my only snow days EVAR was really weird? I am allowed that, yes?

They even had a 2-hour delay the day after, just like the school district in Alabama was such a huge fan of doing!

I mean, having the break extended just a wee bit more was cool, but I still don't like the fact that I'm missing out on school, especially with a ceramics project still in the making. (Speaking of, I'm painting my previous project, but I don't know how long it'll take... I plan to bring it home and take a pic when done.) Plus, delays and days without school mean no seminary!

This is a very minor issue, but I hadn't previously showed a pic of my Christmas cat thumb. I'd barely taken off my nail polish and needed my poor fingers to recover... but I said I'd always have a cat thumb and I meant it! So, this is all I had in terms of that for a while: a cat head with a tiny Santa hat. Be impressed by the size. It is small.

And before school started, Mom really wanted to do our nails again, specifically something fancy on mine. She can't really do much on her own since her nails are too short. But mine are apparently perfect... according to multiple sources. So, we (*coughItriedfirstbutallmyattemptsfailedandsoweusedwhatshemadeinsteadcough*) did the one on water. We saw a video on Youtube where a lady actually let the polish dry on the water, then pulled it out in one piece, then cut up the nail polish disk and stuck the pieces on her nails. It seemed like a better technique, but we now realize it depends on the situation... I think it would've actually been a lot faster for me to just stick my fingers in like most people do and like I've done it before. But oh well. And, well, there was a piece that was perfect for my thumb because it left room for drawing a cat again (orange, this time). So voila! (I wish I could type an accented 'a' with this keyboard... *sad noise*)

THING! Chips Ahoy! cookies with Oreo cream filling (I just barely found out they existed a few days ago) are pretty good, if you can deal with sweet. If not, you're gonz dei.

I've been looking back through all my old works, which is an interesting experience... you know, because I suddenly am catching typos I never noticed before and cracking up at my own jokes all over again... but I also caught more of the one-word-prompts in a few of the reviews that I never actually wrote something for. I've always felt bad about not making something for those, and since I'm wanting to write more, I decided to find all the unfulfilled prompts and write them down someplace, then try to tackle a few of them a little at a time. The prob, Bob, is... I still can't really think of a solid concept for any of them, which is the reason why I never wrote something for them in the first place. *sweatdrop* So, I am thinking maybe I'll ask Scaehime and maybe a few other people for just a word or two, and maybe those will help me think of something for my already-existing prompts... Yep, use prompts to start other prompts, irony, ha. But I probably won't be able to finish any of the prompts otherwise! I need to get my brain back in the game somehow!

That's it, I guess... Except that I'm wondering how important Coatrack will be in the future, since I'm hanging out with him so much- about as much as I did with Beka all those years ago. Will we actually meet  again sometime in the future? Or will this friendship die off like so many of my others, no matter how close we'd been?

Excellence Week? *TITLE FAIL*

Hello world!

So, remember how I said that I finally finished the Faith project for Personal Progress? Well... I liked having posts dedicated to a spiritual experience, so I'm gonna keep doing them. And who knows, maybe I'll end up using posts for another value project in the future, though the subject matter would be different.

All this happened a few weeks ago, starting with the Sunday before Young Women's Excellence Night. It was a great experience that I'd totally be willing to do again.

It was during the YW class in church. In one part of the lesson, the teacher pulled out a paper that she would read off of and asked us to close our eyes. It was like those times in yoga or Health 1 where they said stuff that was supposed to relax you, but instead of things like "imagine being in your favorite place" or something, but more like "imagine the Savior reaching out to you". It'd be difficult to describe everything she had us think about, but I remember it was really powerful, because she gave us a moment to really think about Christ and what he has done for us. I think some of us were close to tearing up, even, and the Spirit was so strong in the room.

After the visualization and stuff, she gave us 5-ish minutes to just soak in the Spirit and read scriptures or something. I actually decided to use that time to look back at some of the Faith project posts, and I realized that I wanted to read off a little bit of one or two of them once Excellence Night came.

And indeed I did! Rena had compiled a video of us doing YW activities over the previous weeks (including some footage from the Sunday before, which I had no idea about!), so we watched that first. I'd been nervous about seeing my part because I thought I'd look really stupid, but I turned out to not look really stupid (except for a few moments later in the video where I made an idiotic face because I hadn't realized the camera caught it but it only lasted a few seconds). My poor mom cried when she saw me talking during the interview after the whole activity with the girls from Chile.

After the video, we all went up one by one to share a short testimony about Young Women's. I think I could've done better, but at least I got to read off a bit of one of my posts and not need to come up with my whole testimony on the spot. I would've freaked out a little more if that was the case...

Anyway, I think I'll quote what it was I read aloud. It was all from "It Is Done":

"A question I was supposed to answer was 'How has Personal Progress helped you in your life?' I'd actually immediately thought back to this, the Faith project, which sadly took over a year to finish, but I'm glad to say is now done.

"At the very beginning I'd been scared of trying to do this, because I was having the hardest time trying to think of experiences to write about. I mean, I don't really remember when I got my testimony for the Church; just kinda felt like I always had it. Unsurprising, since I was born into the gospel and I hardly remember anything from my childhood.

"But, as this project kept going, I realized I have had more spiritual experiences than I gave myself credit for. I'd felt the love and blessings I'd received from God more than I thought. If I only just bothered to remember that day, and how I felt...

"Many times since I've started this project, I've had thoughts that affirmed my testimony in how being part of the Church blesses lives and blesses my own. I can get so frustrated or confused or whatever sometimes, but I can be happy that I know the truth about many things. (...)

"I know that we can see the hand of God working in our lives in both the small and big things (...) if we just try to see it. I know Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are all real and love us very much. I know the Book of Mormon is true and all the modern prophets were called to serve Him. Joseph Smith was not a fake. Nothing ever taught in our Church was made up one day- this is all what Jesus Christ taught and asked of us. The Church is here to make our lives better and happier."

Sometimes I look back at something I wrote and actually impress myself. *chuckle*

This is turning out to be a much more summarized post than I expected. Well, it is WEEKS since all this happened and there's not much I can say about it anyway.

So, the last thing I'll mention today is that the week after(?) I had a cool opportunity with the sister missionaries.

I may or may not have mentioned a family receiving a lesson that I tagged along for in which the dad told us he wasn't sure he'd be able to get himself to read as they wanted him to, though the eldest daughter actually seemed excited by the Book of Mormon. (Yes!!!)

So I went with them the next time they were having a lesson with this family, but it turned out the dad was all alone at home for the moment since his wife and kids went to get groceries. Since I was with them they were able to come in and just talk with him. Even though it's usually better to have the whole family together for lessons, I feel like it was still great to have talked to him because of something that surprised me.

I'd been a bit annoyed when he told us earlier he wasn't good at reading because I thought it might've been him nicely saying he didn't really plan to read. But he explained this time a little more about where he came from and... well... it turned out he really was once illiterate. He said he had to quit school to work when he was quite young and once he was about 15 years old he went to work in Baja California, then some time after that got married and moved here (or maybe moved and got married?). Not only that, but he grew up in one of the areas of Mexico where they actually speak one of the native languages instead of Spanish, and ended up learning some once he was in Baja California, and there was where he started to learn a bit of how to read Spanish too, I think, but I doubt he ever got any actual classes on the language. So, he could technically read the words, but he had trouble actually making sense of what it's supposed to mean, especially with something like the BoM that uses a lot of words that aren't in common speech anymore. I mean, considering all that, it makes more sense why he said he wasn't that good at reading.

We spent that whole time going through the first chapter of 1 Nephi, usually having him read the verses and the sister missionaries explaining what it's talking about. By the end of the lesson (which is of course when his family finally came back home), he seemed actually more excited about seeing what else the book had in store and perhaps felt a little more confident in attempting to read it. That made me happy to see.

I hope I can come along for a lesson with that family again sometime.

Okay, that's it. Probably didn't mean much to any random people out there reading this, but hopefully Future Me remembers this stuff.

I think later today we're gonna be writing our New Year's Resolutions for 2016~ so maybe I'll end up saying what they were later? (Also- we ended up not going to the youth dance. I instead watched the Parasyte live-action movies. So creepster.) K bai!