The World is a Stage

Today we had our annual Curtain Time show. (School talent show.) I was scheduled to sing At Last by Etta James for both shows. (It was a double assembly.) But because we were extremely behind schedule, the last four acts on the program got cut. But everyone who didn't get to perform got moved to the beginning of the second show.

I was kind of worried because I was following a band that did "Don't Stop Believin" and their lead sing is amazing! But I put on a smile and walked out in my favorite dress of all time! The legendary red dress! I always feel hot in it, and between that and the amazing shoes, I was ready to conquer the world. When I walked out and the lights came on, it sounded like someone had turned up the level of the audience! The cheering was amazing! I was put at ease right away. People started clapping with the music and broke out their phones and started swaying them in the air. Every time I hit a hard note, more cheers came, and when the song ended, I heard some of the loudest applause of my life!!!!

Can you say R-U-S-H????

It'd been so long since I've been on the stage, I'd forgotten what an amazing feeling it is!! I used to be heard to say,

"I'm the happiest when I'm on the stage!"

Today, made me remember why!!!

Alyssa Palmer

Prayers Needed Again

Another dear friend of mine is sick in the hospital.
I'd really appreciate your prayers on her behalf!
Thanks!

High School Horrors: Part Four

I'm not gonna lie, sometimes I reallywant to rename this segment:

"High School Whores"

and talk about all the obnoxious girls that I deal with on a daily basis.

That would however, cause lots of drama and speculation and make me seem really really mean and insensitive.

Which, I can be, but that's besides the point at the moment.

Right now, I'm just going to be as real and honest as I can without giving too much away and/or hurting anyones feelings.

I think it sufficeth to say that sometimes, teenage girls are complete and total BRATS!!!!

(And trust me, I'm not excluding myself from this generalization.)

They are selfish, gossipy, prideful, stuck up, nosey, immature, backstabbers and everything else horrible you can think of!!!!

Somedays, I just can't handle it anymore!

The estrogen is just too much!!!!!

It is for that very reason that this story goes as follows:

The other day I was asking Tyler and Jacob who they would take with them on a deserted island if they could only bring four people. After they answered, they asked me. My list was as follows:

1. Tyler

2. Rusty

3. Shirt Boy

4. Jacob

Now I'm not going to act like I'm one of those girls whose always gotten along better with boys than girks and has way more guy friends than girlfriends.

Cause I'm not.

I have a few close gentleman friends who are also some of my favorite people in the whole entire world.

I can talk to them about everything and they keep me sane when I just can't handle females anymore.

But I've got TONS of girls who are like my sisters!!!!!

And I always love em'

No Matter What.

Alyssa Merril

3 is a Magic Number

3 Weekends

3 Boys

3 Amazing Dates

Starting with last weekend:

My friend Kair won a raffle at a stake activity and the prize was a group date for you and four other couples to go watch a movie of your choice on this HUGE screen!!! Well Kair, being awesome invited me and I invited Shirt Boy and we watched Up!! Yes I cried twice!! It was soo cute!!

(The movie, not my crying.) Afterwards we all went to a park and everyone decided to play frisbee. But frisbee's not really my thing...so Shirt Boy and I played on the playground and eventually ended up in a tree. Yes, it was kind of like this: Except we weren't that close to each other!
We each had our own branch!
Anyways, date #1 was quite a sucess!
After the talk that Shirt Boy had,
I came home wanting to be better.
And if that's not a succesful worthwhile date,
then I don't know what is.

Date #2 was last night with my buddy Jacob!
First we had homeade pizza at Sammy's house, DELCIOUS!!
Then we got hot chocolate from QT and went to the Temple Lights and looked around and ate Krispy Kremes.

Afterwards we went back to Sammy's and played

Baby If You Love Me Smile.

Love that game!

Then, to really get us in the Christmas spirit, we watched Miracle on 34th Street.

Best. Christmas. Movie. Ever.

(Jessica if you say one more ill word against it, I will drop kick you from here to China.)

Classic Natalie and Jacob moment.

Date #3 is a week from today.

Winter Formal!!!

After hours and hours of searching, I have a dress and everything to go with it and I'm not going to lie,

the whole ensemble is

FABULOUS!!!!

So fabulous that you're going to have to wait to see it!!

Everyone have a smashing week!!!

Alyssa Mckay

A Conversation of Sorts

You: How are you?
Me: I'm Natastic!!

Me: How many kinds of awesome are you?
Carlos: Infinite
Lauryn: One
Mal: Zero

Me: Do you wanna go a date with me?
Him: I'd love to!
Me: Okay, I'll pick you up around six thirty.
Him: I look forward to that.
Me: Okay bye.
Me: (Cue dreamy smile and girlish giggle.)

Jacob Black: Stay with me!
Me: Okay! You don't have to tell me twice!

Me: Tyler, how do you feel about wearing basketball shorts to Winter Formal?
Tyler: I don't care, whatever you want.
Me: Bless you!

Alyssa LeSueur.

A Question, an Answer, and a...Cake to the Face????

Well, 62% of you were correct:

I asked Tyler to Winter Formal!

I needed a fun way to ask him so Abigail and Avery graciously agreed to help out their Aunt Nat!!!

They sang Jingle Bells and gave him a cake with

Winter Formal???

written on it.

Baked into the cake were the letters of my name.

My handy-cake decorating skills!

This is what happens when obnoxious boys are around!

What a good sport!!!
Thanks Mary for the pictures!!!
I was so sad I had to wait in the car!!!

Well, the story doesn't end there.
A week later, I'm at the church for mutual and a girl from my stake walks in saying
"Natalie, this is for you"
And hands me a container full of ice cream and a paper that says
"I'd love to be the ice cream with your cake, but first you need to thaw me out."
So I put it under hot water and dug through the ice cream till I found a ziploc bag with a paper inside that was blank except for "fire" in little letters.
So I took it home, burnt it and the letters
"Y-E-S"
showed up!!!
(He used lemon juice.)
Happy Day!!!

What else is happy???
I'm going to see New Moon in one hour!!!!
Have a great weekend!!!!

Talk About 180's

So I was half-way through a really bitter,angry, frustrated blog post when one of the people I was frustrated with started talking to me on facebook.

After a long chat with him, the message of this post has been changed.

Instead of being angry and lost, I feel peaceful and focused.

I'm thankful for:

*Girls nights*

Suz, Lyss and Ed all came over tonight for El Charro and a chick flick and it was FANTASTIC!

*True friends*

No matter what, they're always there for me.

Even when I feel like they're not, they are.

*My amazing family*

They love me unconditionally and are always finding ways to support me and help me out.

Whether it be donating at the blood drive I'm running, or giving me jobs to pay for my social life or taking me to get a treat after a hard day, I always feel the love!

*The power of prayer*

It can never be denied. I've seen it in my life way too many times. No matter what, Heavenly Father always answers my prayers.

*Education*

Yes I complain about school and what a pain it is...but truly I am so blessed!

Do me a favor:

Go tell someone you love them and give them a hug.

It just might make their day.

Just to Prove My Teenager-ness

I don't know if any of you read the comments left on my posts, but if you do, you'll notice a regular commenter named Brett and Emily.

Emily is my older sister and I love her more than anything in the world.

So I really value her opinion and sometimes I even do what she says!!

So if you've ever read her comments you'll notice that alot of them go something like this:

"You do know that you're sixteen right?"

or

"You're sixteen sweetie, don't forget that."

Yes I admit, sometimes I get so wrapped up in what I know is going to be a wonderful future, that I forget about my fantastic present!!!

So this post is to show you the girl I am today and just how much of a teenager I am.

I really am as immature of the sterotypes say!

Let me illustrate:

1. I try to throw my little sister in the ocean.

2. I can sleep ANYWHERE, through ANYTHING!

(Here I am sound asleep on a balcony while my little brother takes pictures of me.)

3. I still write "I love so and so"

in the sand and take pictures with it.

I have pictures identical to this one from back when I was in the sixth grade!

4. I'll do anything for my technology!

Here I am doing a dance to get service for my phone so I can finish texting my life away.

5. I like to sit in holes that were dug to get to China.

Which makes sense, since Chinese is the language I'm studying!

6. I make sand angels AND stick out my tongue!

That's a double whammy my friends!

7. I act like I'm driving fake cars since I haven't gotten a permit to drive a real one yet.

8. I wait in hour long lines so I can meet my idols:

Disney Princesses!!!!!

Yes I was the oldest non-parent in that line.

Yes I was the most excited individual.

No I did NOT fake ANY of the enthusiasm exhibited in these pictures.

9. I take pictures of myself making not cute faces.

10. When people try to take pictures of me,

I ruin them by being a goon.

So you see, I'm about as immature as one can get.

And you know what?

I love it!

P.S.

Just to clarify, I do not have a boyfriend.

Ups and Downs

I've got two hard tests tomorrow, so I'll keep this brief.

Today was a LONG day.

At school by 6:30 for seminary, worked all through lunch and after school then went straight to SIAC making my total hours at school 11.

Why????

Two words:

Blood. Drive.

It's on Thursday, and since we don't have school Wednesday, everything has to be done by tomorrow.

Pray for me.

(Btw, if anyone in Mesa wants to give blood, stop by Westwood on Thursday from 8:30-12:30! Or leave me a comment and I can schedule you an appointment.)

Now for the high point in my day:

I made Cantori!!!!

For years at Westwood, it was a tradition to have an extra choir of 16 called

Cantori de Madrigals.

It consisted of four people from each part. They sing mostly a cappela pieces and get to sing at the concerts and other performances in the community. They stopped the choir as a class several years ago but Mr. Harris decided to bring it back this year!!! Any members of honor choir interested just signed up and he chose four from each part. I was worried because almost ALL the altos signed up, but he posted the list today and my name was on it!!!

I'm super excited!!!

Brings a Whole New Meaning to the Phrase: Trick or Treat

Picture this: It's late Sunday, circa 11 pm. I need to go to bed so I'm walking past my kitchen to get to my room when I see this:

Mmmm cupcakes! "But the frosting looks a little funny," I think to myself.

"Oh who cares! Just eat!"

So I do, and look at what happened.

THEY WERE TRICK HALLOWEEN CUPCAKES!!!!!!!!!!
Special huh?

Homecoming Happiness

Homecoming is over!

It was absoloutely fabulous!!!

The assembly went well, our float looked great, the parade was awesome, the half-time show was peachy and the dance was SUPER fun!!!!! For me, the highlight of the entire weekend was having my bff Julie, come down from Texas for the weekend!!!!

(She flies for free.)
I hadn't seen her since August and I was a little worried that things might've changed...but of course they didn't!!
After 10 minutes of being together, it was like she'd never left!!!!
Julie and I have been dreaming about our first dance FOREVER so it was BEYOND FABULOUS to get to go together!!!!
Kim was our hair goddess and Emily did our makeup!!!

I love how awkard we look!

I love us!!

It was so cute, a couple hours before the dance I get a text from Alex that read:

"Glasses or contacts?"

I opted for the glasses, but he's adorable either way!!!

Since it was Halloween, we all got scared!

Then things got solemn.

Macho-Men, Star-Struck Girls!

Our handsome fellas!!

Steven, Alex, Tim and Jack

Cute story:

As Alex walked to my door to pick me up, my mom was in the front yard passing out candy.

He goes up to her and shows her the flower, "Is this okay?"

I LOVED the girls we had in our group!!!!

The boys were jealous of our corsage picture and wanted a flower pic of their own!

Dinner at Steven's Gma's house!!

They ordered in Olive Garden and it was DELISH!!!

Not pictured, is our da activity at Amazing Jakes!!!

Super fun!!!

All you can eat buffet, lazer tag, cosmic bowling, bumper cars, go karts and an arcade!!

But my absoloute favorite part was our three rides on the carousel!!!!!

After the dance we went to QT, Wendy's and Tim's house.

Julie and I got home around 1:15 but didn't go to sleep until 4:30!!!

I just had to take advantage of the time I had with her here!!!

So basically, I had the best first dance anyone could ask for!!!

Next Up??

Winter Formal in less than a month and this time it's Girls Choice!!!