a good costume, a good concert, some good weather, a good future

a good costume...
Well folks October has hit and it's that time of year again. The time of year when girls take advantage of Halloween and being wearing smaller and smaller things. For mostly this reason alone I've always hated Halloween. I went to my first costume party of the season and instead of taking the approach of most girls (wearing as little as possible) my friends and I covered our selves up quite well and went to the dance as Polygamists. It was quite funny, we had name tags that said Wife #1, #2, and #3 and one of our guy friends was our husband. It was so surprising to see how many people loved our costumes. In fact it seemed like the skankiest girls liked it the most and kept asking for pictures with us. Anyway the dance was fun, the costumes were fun, it was just a fun night.

a good concert..
One of my friends asked me awhile back if I wanted to go to a concert with him at the Velour (Provo's hip music venue) and I'm down for pretty much any concert so I said yes. Well we showed up last night and to be honest I didn't even know the band's name until we were at the door, but they're called Book on Tape Worm and they were soooo good. It was a cool experience in itself. Unlike most concerts they set up chairs which I was grateful for, it was nice to relax and soak it all in. They had the entire venue decorated in fake trees and twinkling lights and it felt very much like walking into a fairytale. They were so soo good and I loved every minute of it.


good weather... 
Fall in Utah is incredibly beautiful. I literally walk out my door everyday and loose my breath at the sight of the gorgeous mountains. I seriously can't get over them. For one thing the mountains are just huge and striking but they're also so bright red and orange and for the past couple days there have been foggy clouds constantly rolling over them. I love this crisp, cool weather with everyone dressed up in little coats and boots. Saturday was our Homecoming Football game and we had a black out. The team had sweet new black uniforms and we all sported black as well. Afterwards we had a tailgate dinner with a bunch of friends and it ended in a photo shoot against the beautiful mountains.



a good future...
In Sunday school today my teacher brought up a phrase that I love, he siad, "Have faith filled action not fear filled reaction." I've been thinking about that lately and I it applies to me a lot, especially after the big conference announcement. I've always wanted to serve a mission but when the opportunity prevents itself two years early I started rethinking. My first thoughts were fear filled reaction, thinking about how I turn 19 in a month and how a mission would be harder than I had imagined. Then I calmed down and have taken a more faith filled action approach. I really feel like this announcement's timing is important for me and I feel good about going on a mission but I probably won't be leaving until end of summer so our family can have a month or two with Spencer home and us all together. The more I think about a mission the more excited I get. It's weird talking to my guy friends now and realizing we're all leaving around the same time. I feel like this is a very exciting thing for our freshman class especially and I'm so inspired by so many already stepping up to the call.


My newest art project "foxy"

Thank you Megan Baker for taking beautiful pictures and sharing them with me. 

Madison's currently listening to...

Say for Certain and Greenleaf by Generationals

Nancy From Now On by Father John Misty

Our Deal by Best Coast

Pretty much any Sondre Lerche song

Open Season by High Highs

No Surprises by Radiohead

We Don't Eat by James Vincent McMorrow

Lovely Cup by Grouplove

Anna Sun by Walk The Moon

Little Boxes by Walk off the Earth

Either Way by Beta Radio

I'll Never Leave You- Rogue Wave

Love Away-Captial Cities

College Round 2

*International Cinema- I love love love going to the International Cinema, I've seen two really good films these past two weeks. The first was Paris je T'aime which was a combination of about 20 short stories all set in Paris. I just want to go to Paris so badly. It was the funniest mix of really artsy deep stories to weird vampires and cheap fake blood. I loved it though. The second film I saw was The First Grader about an 84 year old Kenyan man who takes advantage of the government's new policy of free education for all and tries to go back to school to learn to read. It's an incredibly inspiring and sad but good movie. The music is awesome and the kids are the cutest things ever, watching them in school reminding me a lot of the sweet Indian kids that I miss so much. I highly suggest watching both but if you don't have much time watch the First Grader, so good.

*Group Dates- I'm a big fan of group dates. It's a good way to get to know new friends. Last week I got bored in Sunday School and I planned a massive group date. Basically I set up all my friends and it was one massive blind date. All 15 couples went to the good ol' Nickel City where we played some game and a lot of laser tag. It was way fun. A little stressful setting it all up but way fun.

*Dance Parties- I may not be a good dancer but man do I love a good dance party. The first month of school that's like all we did but it's slowed down a little bit.

*Midnight In-N-Out Runs: It's become somewhat of a tradition to fit as many people as I can into my car (sorry mom, i'm safe I promise..) and head over to In-N-Out at midnight on Sundays because at midnight we aren't breaking the sabbath anymore. It's actually quite funny to see how many people show up at midnight, it's quite the party.
*Tunnel Singing- Alright this is sooo BYU so don't criticize (eh utah fans) but on Sunday nights they have tunnel singing, basically about 100 kids show up at the tunnel by the Marriot Center and we sing hymns and people announce their mission calls. It's really a cool thing to be a part of.
*True Blue Foam Slide- This actually happened yesterday but as one of the Homecoming week activities they had a huge slip-n-slide with blue foam. It was so crazy but so fun. I was blue all over, still am in some spots actually, even my contact got dyed blue. It was soo much fun to just dive into pits of blue foam. So weird but so fun.

*The Cannon Center- For you not familiar with BYU the cannon center is where all the kids in the dorm eat. It's honestly one of my favorite places on campus. It's so fun to go in there and see everyone...I mean everyone. Sometime's I'll walk in with one group of friends eat, see another group has walked in, go sit with them and just keep floating around. It's such a good meeting place.
*Classes- My two favorite classes are not Art (2D design) and Sociology. My Art teacher is the bomb. He's in his mid 30's not married and just awkward and great. He gives very open ended assignments and really wants you to focus on art that you love and in developing your style. I love love love it. He has great insight but the class isn't too structured. And he's so funny, such an awkward funny guy. Our assignment for class on Tuesday is to bring our all time favorite song and play it for the class haha college is great. Sociology is awesome as well. I love talking about all these theories and how we are influenced by the society around us. It's so fascinating. Every time I walk out of class I have a new way at looking at situations and people knowing a little bit more of what's behind their motives.

*Stover Hall- I seriously love the dorms. I'm not sad one bit that I don't have my own bathroom, kitchen, or even a living room area to hang out. I love the girls on my floor and I love just walking into each others rooms whenever and staying up late watching movies (lately megs is making me watch all the classic disney channel movies because apparently I had no childhood haha) and chatting about who knows what.
*Football Games- I love BYU football everyone knows that. It's been so fun going to all the games and sitting with by Bountiful friends. This weekend is our homecoming game and the team got new black jersey's their sick I'm excited for the blackout!

*Alpine Slide- The alpine slide is a must for me and we went last weekend and the hills were beautifully yellow! Living in California for two years has made me appreciate Utah's beauty way more, the mountains are gorgeous especially during the fall!

*Friends- I am very grateful for my friends. I have a solid group that I hang out with but it's also fun cause we're always meeting new people. I am very lucky to have met such good and fun kids.

there's probably more that I'm not thinking of but there ya go. College is treating me well. 

Welcome to BYU

I'm gona start off by saying I miss my family. Even if I don't call you very much MOM I still love and miss you. It was especially hard saying goodbye to baby Kate who thought I was going on a mission like Spencer so she was crying pretty hard. Well it's a weird feeling to say I'm actually a student at BYU and to  be finally moved into the dorms. I've wanted to come here for as long as I can remember and it hasn't disappointed. I came up a week earlier than most students to do the Late Summer Honors Course and I am sooo glad that I did. There were only 150 students and we pretty much had the campus to ourselves, no lines in the canon center, no one in the library, and just a few people walking around that you mostly already knew. I became friends with a little group there and it's been really nice to already have a basis of friends before school starts. The rest of the thousands of freshman came on wednesday and it's been fun chaos since then. It's insane how many people that you don't know walk past everyday. It's like the hunger games of friend making, everyone scrambling to meet people and establish groups and find cute guys and on and on. It's kind of stressing me out and exhausting too, but very exciting. 

It's been really funny catching up with my best friends from BHS. This was at the pep rally at the stadium which was complete with fireworks and t-shirts. Gotta love it. Sitting there watching the football film being played on their brand new screens was making me so giddy. I don't know what it is with my and BYU football but it's a sacred experience haha. 

 This is the late summer honors crew, Megz, Sedge, Lyman 6000, Mad-dawg, and TColt

 I took a class that was based of understanding our relationship with the spaces and architecture around us and trying to explain it. We had class up at Squaw Peak and wrote about the view, I loved it.

 We're still not quite sure what to do every night, we've taken a couple Denny's runs for the $2 unlimited Hot Chocolate.

 Lyman is always mixing things up like grapes and ice cream...

 I finally met my roommate! I had been living by myself for a couple of days and It's so exciting that she's now here! I feel like we already knew each other. We're gonna have a good year that's for sure.

 The denim hats. We bought out these denim hats and we wore them around campus yesterday haha we had quite the variety of opinions, some strange looks and then kids who thought they were awesome. Gotta love the DI.

 This is what the honors kids do for fun, watch foreign films in the basement wooo

 Black light mini golfing and lazer tag

My desk all decked out.

Meet Megan/Meg/Megz. We both did LSH and we instantly became friends. We both want to Minor in Art and are just oddly similar. We've been sticking together so far and it's been grand.

I'm really excited to go to church on Sunday and get to know a smaller group well, I've already met some fun kids and my ward seems awesome. I'm also excited for classes to start on Monday, wish me luck!

three

Every night after family time I usually walk back from the boy's hostel by myself. It's lovely because the weather is finally perfect and the moon is just beautiful and occasionally on a clear night the stars are pretty incredible. I love this walk because without fail every night I feel an overwhelming feeling of love and gratitude. I'm so grateful to be in such a beautiful part of the world. To be honest on my first car ride to the Rising Star Campus beautiful was not one of the many adjectives I would have used to describe India but the more I'm here the more beautiful it becomes. I'm grateful to have this opportunity to refresh myself in between high school and college, to look beyond my high school years and get excited for the opportunities that lie ahead. I feel such deep love for these little kids. Especially the kids in my house but just all of them. They have such a beautiful spirit about them. In our lesson in church on Sunday the branch president talked about the first step to eternal salvation being love. I was a little surprised because I hadn't really thought about that. Then he shared the scripture in 1st John 4:8 which reads, "Behold, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love." Reading this I had the impression that these kids so full of love are such a testimony of God, because God is love. Every night as I walk back I think about how hard it is going to be to say goodbye to these kids. That became even more real tonight because it was our last time going to family time. I really can't believe I only have one more day here at Rising Star. I really am going to miss having little boys pulling at my arms and hearing "Medicine, Medicine!!" "Auntie sit with me, sit with me!" I'm going to miss their cute cute little smiles and excitement about life. One of the kids I'm going to miss most is Jeeva. He's cute little Gopi's older brother and he's just a bigger version of Gopi and pretty much just as cute. I'm going to miss calling his name and having him turn around to see the biggest smile on his face and to have him running up to me for a hug. He's my little pal, we always sit together and we always play cards at night. He's a little shy but he's so sweet. I love watching him take care of Gopi, he's a very patient and selfless little kid. 

(This is Jeeva, yes I know I look super sweaty, sorry that it's extremely humid here haha. This was right after the kid's talent show. The older kids turned on Tamil music and the kids went INSANE and were dancing like crazy and it was just epic.)

I had another moment of gratitude and love as we were sitting at dinner today. All of the volunteers eat dinner on the roof under a big canopy. We eat our red rice, curry, fruit, veggies (and french fries today yay mondays!) off  of banana leaves and we just talk and laugh. I love going around the table to hear everyones Highs and Lows of the last couple of days. The sunsets have progressively gotten brighter and more beautiful and tonight's was so amazing. The sky was so pink and orange behind the palm trees and I was just feeling so grateful. I'm very grateful to have made such good friends this session. 

My other powerful moment of the day I guess you could call it was during Medical. There are a couple of jobs you can do when you're on medical duty and people usually fight over who gets to wash the ulcers and oil the feet. But today I wasn't part of that rotation at all I did the Blood Pressure instead. It was easy but in the beginning I just felt like it wasn't as monumental. It turned out to be the best thing for me. I loved being able to talk to the patients without having a mask on and a lot of work to do. I just got to sit right next to them, pat their shoulder, hold their hand, try to get them to dance and attempt at speaking Tamil with them.  The colony we were in today was a big one and the people there were so amazing. They had such a unique happiness about them. There was one lady who didn't have legs from her knees on so she knelt on a scooter type thing. She was beautiful and I sat on the floor next to her as I took her blood pressure and held her hand as she got her glucose taken and I was so inspired by her. I thought seeing the people with leprosy would just make me feel so sad for them but it hasn't been like that. Every time I've gone to medical I've left feeling so happy and uplifted. I think it's because most of these people don't feel sorry for themselves. They are humble and have learned how to be really happy and that's what is inspiring.

Little boys and paint

Today was super! I find myself saying super way too much because it means the same thing in Tamil as it does in English so we always say it to the kids. I had tutoring again today which was fun. I love eating lunch with the kids. I love walking into the dining hall and having lots of little boys come and ask me to sit with them, they make me feel very loved. I kind of always sit with my house though because I've gotten to know these cute boys so well! I got to read with Jeeva today as my last student of the day. He is absolutely adorable. The book we read was about a girl named Maddie which was very exciting for both of us. Another girl in my group got a very cute picture of us that'll post later, she's currently de-liceing her room. During recess today a little boy ran over holding a dead mouse by it's tail and threw it another girl. It was so gross I was dying. I tried to get the kids to stay away from the mouse and finally one of the boys covered it with dirt. Ew. TII (This is India). I made a breakthrough today with one of my favorite little boys. His name is Gopi and I just adore him but he usually doesn't care enough to let you hold him or take pictures of him but today as we walked back from lunch he insisting on holding my hand and pressed his little cheek against my arm as we walked to the school. It was just the best thing ever.

Today was Arts and Crafts day which was so fun and extremely chaotic. The kids went so crazy. The younger kids started out finger painting, which I'm not sure if they've done before. They were a little hesitant at first but it ended with paint everywhere. All over faces and clothes and basically we had to hose down most of the kids, but they loved it so much and it was so cute to watch.

Meanwhile in our little Parakeet room we've been having some great boy chats. I've forgotten how nice it is to have girl friends. It makes me even more sad to leave knowing I won't see these girls everyday, but even more excited for college!