20 years old.

well, i have officially been robbed of my youth.
twenty, you are not welcomed with open arms,
but you make a pretty good grand entrance.

i started off with my yearly tradition i have with my mother of going shopping and spending all of my birthday money. let me tell you, it's the best. my parents and i then went out for my birthday dinner at cracker barrel. (who knew that place was so delicious?? my parents dragged me kicking and screaming last year and now i think that it's the best.)

one of my really good friends, jared, had his birthday three days before mine. to celebrate both of our birthdays we went to skate city. (the obvious choice for people's birthdays when they are turning 20 and 22). while we were skating (and avoiding nasty middle schoolers taking an over-abundance of selfies) our fried codi went up to the dj station to request a song. little did we know, he was telling the dj it was our birthday. five minutes later the lights came on and everyone had to get off of the rink except for jared and i, who had to stand in the middle of the rink as happy birthday was sang to us. probably one of the best/worst moments of my (and i'm sure jared's) life. thanks nicolette and codi, you sneaky devils. (nicolette also gave me two giant bags of gummies- so all was forgiven (and eaten)).

lastly, i had a package that had come all the way from belgium just for my birthday for me. i had strict instructions not to open it until my birthday, so naturally i stayed up until midnight until it was officially my birthday and tore into my envelope. what was inside, you ask? oh, you know, just a journal that a certain missionary had been writing to me EVERY day for 6 months in. i may have just sat there and cried before even opening the journal and starting to read. i then opened the journal and read until i fell asleep with the journal on top of my face. (i'm really classy, i'm aware.) it was the greatest of all birthday presents you could get. i laughed out loud at his crazy adventures and cried (and cried and cried) when he had a hard day. i felt more loved than i have in a long time and it was just what i needed to get through these last two (!!!!!) months of having my best friend gone.

i finished off my birthday watching general conference (soooo good! amiright??) with my parents, eating a lot of frozen yogurt cake and skyping my lovely siblings in utah. it was a delightful day to welcome me into the geriatric age group. (how old do you have to be to get the senior discount at stores and restaurants?)

in other news, if there was ever a shirt that described me:

this would be it.

100.

DAYS. LEFT. i seriously did not think it was possible to actually get to this point. i'm pretty sure i looked at all of the other girls who had their missionaries home and had just decided that they had lied. two years never really comes to an end. these guys never really come home. you just have to suffer like the lonely baby that you are while you submit yourself to realizing they are gone forever. negativo compleanos. 

but! OH HO HO, i was all sorts of wrong. apparently, times does go on. (who knew, right?) and now i have 100 days to run enough miles to work off all of the food i ate while in the above-mentioned phase. (plus the blondie i just ate… ok, three blondies i just ate. judge a woman.)

commence running. (or painfully slow jog/walking.)

my current screensaver. because now i actually will see you SOON. holla.

oh, and this is his view right now. jealousy abounds.

once upon a time (two weeks ago) i ordered new glasses. i was all sorts of wanting the ridiculously large hipster glasses, but my mom (bless her soul) talked me into getting the smaller, classier glasses that didn't take up 87% of my face. and now i love them, and actually feel like a 20 year-old college student instead of the high school freshman that picked out my last pair of specs. kudos, momma. kudos.

excuse the shameless selfie.

never ever have i won any sort of contest. well kneaders (my new favorite restaurant) was doing a giveaway for a valentine's day date night. if you entered and won they would send you a gift card to kneaders and to the movie theater right next door, so that you and your valentine could go out on valentines day! ludicrously tender, right? so i decided that i would enter and i seriously hoped i would win! and then two days later my mom comes to me and was like "hey i randomly entered this kneaders giveaway and i won!" so i still haven't won anything. but my mom took me to kneaders on valentines day because my dad had to work late, so i still kinda won. (at least i like to think so.)

this post has an alarming amount of selfies. my b.

and i will end this post with a picture of my dog in one of those russian-looking winter hats. i laughed far too much while taking this picture.

so you made it twenty months

without your best friend.

that's right,
TWENTY JEFFIN MONTHS.
twenty months of:
-being grumpy.
-not wearing makeup/real pants/not putting in my contacts because i just don't care.
-watching videos like this and this and this over and over again. (plus a million more. many hours have been wasted watching homecoming videos.)
-eating heinously unhealthy foods. (i may or may not be eating a s'mores cupcake while writing this. we'l never know for sure.)
-saying "i'm gonna get fit now!" at every month mark. (it's starting to take effect…)
-staying up late to write letters instead of studying for tests.
-mainly, just missing that crazy kid i am lucky to call mine.
4 MONTHS LEFT, FOOLS.
see you soon.

who gave him that sweater? no idea. but they
 should keep giving him insatiably attractive clothing.

LATELY:

-so i mentioned in my last blog post that something went wrong with my car, but that i got it fixed. well, like three days later i loaded up my little car and started my drive down to utah, where i would pick up all of my family and then we would all drive home to beautiful colorado for christmas! except for an hour and a half into my drive down to utah my battery started to die. i was able to pull over into the nearest gas station in MCCAMMON, IDAHO. literally the middle of nowhere. there was nothing even close to a car repair shop anywhere around. i would have to drive back a half hour to pocatello to get my car worked on. except my car didn't drive. and it was 4:45- all of the mechanic shops would be closing in 15 minutes. so, i put on my big girl pants (after calling my parents in a frantic panic), called a mechanic shop to tell them i would be coming, called a tow truck to come and pick my up and cried by myself in a booth in the gas station until the tow truck came. not one of my brightest moments.

lyle on the back of a tow truck. not something i ever
wanted to see.

 i was going to have to stay in a nasty motel that night but then my sister-in-law called her cousins who live in pocatello and they came and picked me up from the auto shop, brought me back to their house, fed me, watched a movie with me, let me sleep in their guest room and then took me back in the morning. i was SO grateful for them. kind people, man. they're the greatest.

-wow. that was long. take a breather.

-i had my whole family home for christmas this year. and it was amazing.

AMAZING life-size gingerbread house at the broadmoor.
even more amazing siblings.
(cheesiness for the win.)

aaron eating the lobster of our traditional surf&turf
christmas dinner

new year's hiking.

-my dad went out and checked the mail one day and nonchalantly put a package in front of me when he came back in. my heart nearly stopped beating when i saw that this was no ordinary package, this was a package from FRANCE. and it had this little beauty in it.

holy gorgeous necklace.

you win this round, elder. 

-i started back at work again. i walked into the room that had my old kids in it and they looked at me so confused for a minute before saying "anne!!" in their little voices. my heart melted.

-if you watched the super bowl (like most american humans) and you were watching right after it ended, then you saw this amazing commercial that my amazing sister-in-law wrote. she's pretty much the coolest human ever, and i am not related to someone famous. no biggie.