the [windy] city

This past week was October Break.

Most went to Cali.

The unfortunates stayed home.

Me?

I went to Chicago.

Kind of an out-of-the-box place, I know, but it was absolutely fantastic. Saturday afternoon, my mom and I flew up to THE WINDY CITY to visit my beautiful sister and her family for the entire week! 

We were always on the go, there are so many things to see there.

We went to the Lincoln Park Zoo

{Aren't my nieces adorable? That's Coco on the left and Montana on the right}

{Me and the girls in the green house}

We also visited the Sears Tower (now called the WILLIS TOWER). 

On the very top floor there's a sky deck, where you can go stand out on this glass-bottom-window-thing. 

It was absolutely horrifying. See that face?

Sheer terror.

 (Please take note of the three-year-old in the background.)

See this?

Fearless.

Definitely doesn't get that from her aunt.

In the city we planned on taking a peek in the American Girl Doll store for the little girls, but that turned out taking a little bit longer than expected. The store's a gong-show!

{Here's Montana dressed up like Rebecca}

We made a day out of visiting the Catingy Gardens...

{The rose garden was my favorite by far!}

While we were there, we figured we'd might as well visit colleges. This is us at Elmhurst.

But while we were in the city of Elmhurst, we happened to drive past a certain high school.

YORK
I just about flipped a lid when I saw it. For those who don't know, York is one of the best cross country schools in the country. They're a legend, I'll leave it at that.

We also visited a bunch of the little shops around my sister's neighborhood, which was so nice. The towns were gorgeous with the leaves turning orange, and everything was completely decked out for Halloween.  I could actually tell what season it was!
Strange, right?

el baile {THE DANCE}

So I went to HOMECOMING with Scottie Upchurch. My group was the best, practically all my friends were in it. Dinner was great, the dance was crazy, and the night activity was way fun!

(That's us)

The beautiful girls!

las favoritas

Me and Kenz

Cross country. We stick together.

[at the dance]

Success.

I got asked to homecoming!

Aren't those shoes fantastic?

Hi my name is Kim, and I like to do fun things and not take pictures.

So this last week I've been up at BYU running my little heart out at cross country/track camp.
 To say the least, it was amazing! I absolutely love running, and it's been awesome having a week completely centered around it.
I'm weird, I know. 
Really though, it was inspiring. 
The team up at BYU consists of rockstars--they're completely crazy. In a past post I talked about how much I wanted to run for BYU Hawaii, buut then I found out that they don't even have a track team. I was heart broken. But now since this past week, I'm completely set on BYU Provo. 
It's a magical place.

GO COUGS!

tadaa!

Hey! Notice anything different?

Welp. You should. Cause I changed ere'thang (on this blog)!

This was quite difficult for me, because sometimes change is difficult, and I get attached to things really easily. But it's for the better! I feel it's a little bit more mature, would you agree?

summerchecks.

Hey good news!

 I've been working on that summer checklist, quite a bit actually, and

today I volunteered for my first time at a child refugee center.

I've fallen completely in love!

The kids were so adorable, and I was just blown away by them. These kids have had it so bad, some abused, others neglected, and worse. But they were all so happy! Really, I've never felt so loved by anyone than those little kids in that short amount of time I spent with them. Buut unfortunately, I got sick the very next day so I can't go for a while.

Such a bummer.

THE HORROR.

Everything has its ups and downs.

Up: Last night I was in a pool.

Down: It was empty.

Up: I watched the coolest episode of Man vs. Food.

Down: It was on at one thirty this morning.

Up: I learned how to drive with my left foot.

Down: Because I can't use my right one.

Up: I got to leave summer school early.

Down: Because I was hurtin.

And why was I hurting? Cause I got stung by a scorpoin. 

AGGHHH!

 The agony.

Dear scorpion, I don't like you. It's nothing personal, I'd just be a lot happier if we hadn't met last night. You caused me much grief, and I think you should stop breathing for the rest of your life.
Sincerely, Kim.

a positive affirmation.

Feeling down in the dumps? Sometimes all you need for a good pick-me-up is just a positive mind set.

Or, you could just watch this.



I died.

SUMMER

AHHHHHHHHHHH!

I honestly thought it would never happen.

But it did. Finally, summer has arrived!

Score. 

Really, I'm so stoked for this, and I'm making a promise to myself that this summer: I'm really going to get things done. So here's a list of things I'm going to do! (Or else.)

1. Volunteer. Child Crisis maybe? I really feel like everything I do is just for me, and I just want to help out!

2. Learn to cook. Really, a kitchen is probably one of the more dangerous places for me to be in. Let's be honest, I'm most likely going to go away for college in a little over a year, and I would rather not live off of cereal and peanut butter sandwiches.

3. Run. So I've decided to quit volleyball and run cross country in the fall, and I think it would be cool to actually be good at it. And like coach says "the best cross runners are made through May and July." Why not just give it a shot?

4. Get good arms. Okay, this one is kind of weird, but I've always been secretly jealous of girls with toned arms. I'm not saying I want bulging biceps, but it would be nice to actually be able to do more than ten push ups.

5. Go to the temple. Sorry to get all religious here, but it really makes a difference in my week if I go to the temple. So I'm going to go more!

6. Make music videos. My friends and I are already all up on this one, we made the first of many to come on the second to last day of school. To be short, it rocked. Maybe I'll post it when it's all edited?

7. Live it up. So this really isn't that much of a goal, but I'm not going to waste these next couple of months away. This is my last summer of high school for crying out loud!

O AMERICA, i hear you.

A couple of months ago, I joined the East Valley Mormon Choir Organization, and last I had my first concert with them. It was amazing! Really, I'm so grateful I could be a part of it. The concert was patriotic themed, and the whole shabang was called, "O America!" And that was also the title of our last song, which was composed by the fabulous William Joseph. 

Oh and guess what? 

He was there! 

Yep, William Joseph was in the concert too. Couldn't get over it. Nbd.

The spirit was so strong too. It's really breathtaking how powerful music is, and it's amazing how it can be so moving. But the music wasn't all church stuff though, William Joseph played one of his classics "Piano Fantasy," with this INCREDIBLE violinist who had just graduated from Juillard. She was a total rockstar. I was literally in awe.  

a little critical

"I'm truely, honestly, madly, passionately IN LOVE WITH YOU!!" 

{This little quote is brought to you by Letters to Juliet}

I'm sorry. It's a really cute idea for a movie, and the scenery is ABSOLUTELY incredible, but did you get a load of that line up there? Ridiculous. It's like the guy had a thesaurus throw up on him. But it's a good laugh I guess!

distracted.

You know when there's something you absolutely have to do, like write a report, but you just can't bring yourself to do it? Liike you do everything on your "to-do" list, until it's the only thing left, but you still can't seem to buckle down? And when you finally put in the effort to sit down in front of the computer to start researching, the only web site you can seem to type into the address box is facebook? 


Yeah. That's happening to me right now.


I guess you could say I get a little distracted, but honestly, I'm supposed to do a report on the life of Emily Dickinson. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to make a life consisting of sitting indoors, writing all day sound exciting? Well, it's not easy.


Hmm...maybe I'll just bs it? Good idea. 

track

Holy oh my goodness! I'm sorry. I've been bad at blogging. However, it's not entirely my fault because I've been extremely busy lately with track! But now it's over and I promise to be better. Except... I MISS TRACK! I'm definately not one do to a sport just for the social aspect of it, but I'm really going to miss all my teammates and practicing together. But mostly, I miss racing. Oh well, guess there's still next year.

{"The handoff!" I was usually the first leg of the four by eight, until around the end of the season. This picture is from Desert Classic I believe, that was our first invite of the season}

springBREAK.

PRETTY MUCH... Spring Break ruled.
The whole week was pretty much nonstop with my sisters and their little ones coming in town to visit and then playing with the girls.My week was filled with swimming, hikes, Just Dance, morning runs, bonfires, parties (ha..), and picnics. Basically one of my best Spring Breaks ever!

I apologize. Really I am soo bad at taking pictures, we only had a camera one day for the whole week!
However. On Friday, a bunch of us kids went to Tempe town lake, and we saw this lovely gang of bamfs on segues. {I almost died.}

ME.{bykenz}

So I have a wonderfully talented best friend, her name is Kenzie.

Kenzie likes photography.

She is very good at it too.

I 'm sure she will be a great photographer some day.

WAIT.
Just kidding.
She already is!

So lately Kenzie's been practicing taking pictures of different girls, and last Wednesday it was finally my turn! I was super stoked, and it was way fun playing model all around the town. Here are some of my favorites...

[These are just some of my favorites, we took over four hundred!]

wootwoot.

So uhh basically...I'm just going to make this short and sweet.

I GOT ASKED TO PROM!

yesssssssssssssss.

catching up.

So much has been going on lately! But here's what's been on my mind...

Firsts things first, this:

I am in an abusive relationship with track.

It expects so much out of me.

It hurts me. (hurt is an understatement)

But I love it.

Next I'm stressing is this:

It's BYU Hawaii. I want to go so badly.

But wait my grades aren't too hot (I have a C),

I 'm broke,

I have no time to do service,

and my parent's couldn't possibly send their last kid

over seas.

Gr.

And finally! This:

This picture pretty wraps up my love life completely.

Two black shadows!

Haa kidding. But I'm uncertain about them boys.