be excited.

"the minute you begin to do what you really want to do, it's really a different kind of life." 

-buckminster fuller

last thursday completed the whitakers journey at provo high school. ashlee marie graduated with high honors,  received a 4.0 her whole senior year, and she was the last of eight whitakers to have attended provo high school. 

i'm so proud of her and loved being there for part of her special day. after the ceremony we went to rachels house and had a fun family party filled with panda express (ash's favorite), presents and college survival tips. we were all so exhausted come night time but ash was a trooper and still made it to some of her senior all night party. 

the next morning i forced her to rise bright and early so we could go to st george for a little weekend getaway. i drove (with a little too much mt dew to help me stay awake) while ash slept and we eventually made it to st george. i experienced for the first time checking into a hotel by myself-so adult like. we were only able to stay through saturday so we made the most of our time and immediately started laying out. we rented bikes for a day (the only ones left were way too big for us. oh well, it was fun anyway) and had a blast riding around in the perfect 88 degree weather. lunch was a disaster and we were not satisfied with jimmy johns sandwiches so we got cafe rio for dinner. after we gave our tummies a rest we went to dixie rock, and tried out nielsen's frozen custard. we were exhausted once again so we retired fairly early and fell asleep while watching legally blonde. on saturday we went to breakfast, checked out of our hotel, still stayed and swam/laid out, turned our bikes back in, changed from swimsuits into sunday clothes in the car so we could do baptisms at the temple and visited with my friend cody who i haven't seen for almost a year. i ate too much (like i usually do), got sunburned (like i usually do), and loved spending time with my little sister (like i always do). i took the whole week off of work and exercise so now it's time to get back in the routine of things. 

i love you little sister. i'm excited for you to start this stage of your life and i know you will make the most of it!

be there.

"god calls you to the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." 

frederick buechner

i need something. i don't know what but i feel like right now something is missing. i can think of a number of things that i think are missing but that might not be what god knows is missing. he knows what i need right now and in his time he will send them my way. until then i'll stick around, live the way i know i should, and hope this feeling of not being whole will soon be gone. 

be brave.

"most of our obstacles would melt away if instead of cowering before them, we should make up our minds to walk boldly through them." -orison swett marden


for some reason i decided to sign up for a half marathon. those of you who know me know that i'm not a runner. i don't love it, i'm not good at it and i usually just don't do it. completing a half marathon has been on my mind though and it quickly made it on my list of things to do. i thought that after training for a few months it would be easy and i would be ready. turns out trying to train while working two jobs and going to school was a little harder than i thought. i had only run up to six miles and barely ran three miles, three times a week. i still wanted to do it and felt like if i didn't follow through with it i wouldn't be this close again for a long time. at 8:00 am on may 7, 2011 i began the run in downtown provo with my one of my best friends, her sister, and her brother in law. i felt ok for a while but then i felt like i was going to pass out and didn't feel like i could go on. (having my ipod die by mile 3 didn't help either...) but for whatever reason i was able to keep up with mich and whit and we all finished together- in 2 hours and 12 minutes! that was much faster than i thought and i'm proud of us. the feeling of finishing and having run basically all of it was a great feeling and i really did feel like i accomplished something big. it's been a few days and i'm still sore and i still have a stomach ache from all the chocolate milk i drank after. but it was worth it. half marathon, check.