Engaged!

Life is absolutely insane right now... but I love it.

First and foremost, I am engaged to Paul Hannibal!!
It happened late on Friday night (Jan 21st).
It was a complete surprise.
I wasn't expecting anything til late February.
However, Paul was all sorts of sneaky and bought the ring without me even know.
He did such a great job :]
I seriously love it.

The date for the wedding is set: May 26, 2011
And today, I made one of my biggest purchases--
Airplane tickets!
Paul and I are flying home a week before the wedding so I can be with my family the first time I go through the Temple. I am so dang excited!
Life is good.

Christmas Break in Photos

21

It's official.

This girl is twenty-one.
More pictures of my wonderful birthday to come...

Fall Festivities.

I have no legitimate excuse for my failure to blog the past few weeks.

Forgive me?
Life has been pretty exciting, though.
I've definitely been keeping myself busy. So let's get started!

Fall is in the running for my favorite season. I can never decide between that or Springtime. I can never get enough of the changing leaves, perfect weather (Jackets & Jeans are where it's at), the excitement that accompanies the start of school, new friends, pumpkin pies/carving/candles...anything pumpkin, really. Ah, I just love it all.

When the leaves started to change, I just had to get out and enjoy them. Ergo, I went hiking with some buddies. We went up into Sundance and did a little bit of the Timp trail head. Unfortunately, Kait and I were not well prepared (we were wearing flippy floppys) so we didn't get too far before we had to turn around. It was loads of fun though,
Please note the pictures:


My roommate, Kaitlin, is keeping me busy. She is a riot. I have loved living with this crazy chica. I adore her. We have fun doing various things, such as: running around in 80's prom dresses, finding "cute" clothes at Saver's, attending General Conference, going to bed and waking up at ridiculous hours... you know, we do it all.


The nursing program has been fairly taxing this semester. Fortunately, I have lots of great friends that lighten the load. For example, my nursing buds throw rad parties so we can do our homework together. The pictures below are from a night when we watched WIT together for our communication class. I also have friends who subject themselves to me so I can learn new skills. Paul is an example of this. In clinical, there are some comatose patients that need to be shaved. The thought of shaving some dude's face scared me. Paul was a trooper and he volunteered his face so I could be more confident in lab. That's right, ladies and folks, I shaved my first face this fall. The fun with nursing doesn't stop here. We're also required to attend a research conference once a semester. This is where my friends provide entertainment to get me through the day. There's nothing quite like taking candid photos of your sleeping friends. Nurse Panda stays awake with me though.






Fall = Halloween.
I love Halloween. I love how crazy everyone gets. I'm not the best at coming up with good costumes, but dang am I good at enjoying them!



This October marked the first birthday in my apartment. Miss Jessica turned 23! We had a little drink night, danced a little and ate tasty cake. Good times.




Since their marriage, I have seen very little of Ben and Becca. Directly following their marriage, they left for Arkansas to make some moolah. Since their return to Provo, we have all been quite busy. However, this past month, we found some time to go on a double date to Fuddruckers. Man, do I love a good burger, fries and malt. And although I don't have any pictures of it, I've also been able to see Ruth and Dan. I am so lucky to have a couple of siblings out here with me.




Last but not least, I wanted to put in a little shout out to the Temple. I haven't been able to go as often as I would like, but I am so grateful that we have numerous Temples in such close proximity here in Utah. There's nothing as calming, reassuring and uplifting as going to the Temple.



If you have made it to this point of the post, I am very impressed. I'll try my best to post more often so I don't have to assault you with pictures again. Til then!

Shootin' People Up.

I took some giant leaps and bounds this week.
The biggest one:
I gave my first shot!
That's right, ladies and gents...
I stabbed Amanda with a needle.
No lie, it is freaking scary to stick a big fat needle into your friend.
Panda was a champ though.
Who knows, maybe YOU will be my next victim.

She & Him.

A couple weeks ago, I joined Jeff, Connecticut and Rachel at
The Twilight Concert Series.

The concert opened with the Dum Dum Girls,
whom, despite their silly name, were quite enjoyable.
They had a very unique wardrobe that helps set them apart from most girl bands.
Following their short, solid set, we waited in great anticipation for the main attraction.
There was lots of shoving, as people tried to squeeze up front.
Being 5'4", I was not a happy camper.
Especially tall people took a liking to parking themselves right in front of me.
By the time the real show started, I made friends with some tall guys who provided the perfect window for me to see the stage. Gotta love nice people.
The show itself was fantastic.
This was my first real encounter with She & Him.
I've heard LOTS about them from Jeff, but had only heard a few of their songs.
One concert was all it took to convert me.
You should probably Youtube them right now.

"I can't wait to go to bed tonight knowing I saw Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward"

Adventures in Moab

This has been a stellar week.

Whenever I'm in Utah, it's because I have school.
That's why I was so insistent to arrive a week early;
so I could do whatever I wanted.

One of the things I decided to do was go to Moab with a few of my Nursing friends.
I drove down with Amanda, where we proceeded to hike in Arches National Park.
Please refer to video:

It was hot and I was very sweaty, but it was lots of fun.

Later that evening, we hooked up with Spencer and some of his friends from work.
We went on a night hike to an arch that we were supposed to repel...
Amanda and I chickened out on the repelling part,
NOT because that part scared us, but because the hike up to the arch was the sketchiest thing in the world. I had a genuine fear for my life as I began the climb up, and I eventually worked my way back down before I died. Spence and his buds still repelled though, and it was fun to watch them.
Left: Malayna repelling upside down
Right: Spencer's silhouette above the moonlight as he repelled
Bottom: Amanda and Me, safe on the ground


That night, Amanda and I stayed at a hostel.
I would say that it's one of my more unique experiences.
Everyone else there was male and old.
It'd be safe to add sufficiently creepy to that list too.
Oh, and I can't forget to mention that we were awakened in the morning by the lovely sound of a drunk man vomiting in the bathroom next to our room.

That nasty memory was soon forgotten,
as Spencer took us on the coolest rafting trip ever!
It was so so so much fun.
I can't even explain what an amazing day it was.
It was the perfect mixture of thrill from the rapids and serenity from the nature that surrounded us. I'm set upon going back next summer.

After rafting, Spencer took us to a custom T-shirt shop.
We took our own shirts (Less than $2 a piece)
and picked any design they had ($3).
So we ended up with cool Moab shirts for under 5 bucks!
Talk about a sweet deal.

I cannot reiterate how much fun I had.
I love my friends and I love making memories with them.