dorm room.

a big thank you to those who commented on my last post! College is definitely getting much, much better! {like, I absolutely adore it!} It's basically everything I've hoped for. Today, Sam and I spent part of the afternoon drinking Jamba Juice and walking around all the service opportunity booths! What other college would have such a hugh "Y-serve" center {there had to be at least 40 booths!} We may just drop out of school so we can join all of them. Just to keep this short, here's the place I'll be living for the next 8 months!

We also took the class photo last night! Here's a time lapse video of it. And here's the picture stolen off the facebook page (:

Anyways, I'm sorry it's so short and whatnot, but I'm in a hurry! 

P.S. I love everything about here. seriously. Everyone is so dang friendly, and I love ending half of the talks with "amen". Oh, and I went to the Humanities orientation... yep. so psyched. 

Sincerely,

Erica Michelle

the first post about college.

Well, it's been interesting to say the least. Both my roommate {Kayla} and I moved in on tuesday! She is just wonderful... I mean seriously, the best roommate I could have asked for! I absolutely love our dorm room {pictures to follow... soon!}

Today was definitely different then I expected. I'm not necessarily homesick, but I'm just missing some things about home. {namely the stars, my best friends, the stars, nice boys, the stars, my bed, the stars, annnddd ummmm looking at the stars.} We had a dance//carnival welcoming thing for our housing place, and I met lots of new people! The girls on my hall already seem super nice! I can't wait for the rest of the year (:

when people say the first few days are rough, I totally understand where they come from. It's not something that you can expect, and sadly, it's not really that different from high school. Luckily, I have an awesome roommate, plus I'm at this awesome college, and I have this awesome girl just a walk away {not to mention a crying phone call away}, and these cute nephews aren't too far either (:

Tomorrow {or possibly satuurday} will be pictures of my amazing roommate, my a d o r a b l e dorm room, and hopefully an awesome day of orientation tomorrow! I'm looking forward to getting more use to this college life, no worries.

Sincerely,
Erica Decker

boston {part 2}.

We got to go to the Red Socks vs. Yankees game on Friday night! They completely and epically lost... but it's ok, because I got a cool hat! plus, as mean as this sounds, it was a little funny hearing the entire stadium boo and chant "you do steroids" whenever a-rod was up to bat.

Outside of watching a few minutes of high school baseball games, plus a Rockies game literally about 10 years ago... this was my first actual baseball game! And I do believe I've found myself a new favorite sport to watch (:


GUESS WHAT? I got to cross off something on my bucket list! I stood on top of a light house! And the light house was just fascinating and beautiful!!!

We rented bicycles and rode through the most beautiful part of Cape Cod! {seriously, though}

Touring the oldest commission ship in the US Navy {all the way from the revolutionary war!}... the USS Constitution.

Plimoth plantation! {everyone was dressed up like the pilgrims... and they talked like it too... quite hard to understand}

Plus the last couple days we stayed right on the ocean in Cape Cod!

We toured some cool Boston sites and Lexington and Concord {see... I told you that I'm not going in order}

annnnddd we took this great picture!

We drove to Newport, Rhode Island and toured these HUGE mansions! The Vanderbilt mansion was 138,000 square feet. yep, I typed that right. It's like 40 times bigger than my house. literally. It was magnificent, though! It basically felt like I was touring Downton Abbey {plus we went on the "servants" tour} and the architecture was sooooooooo cool.

they had pretty fancy gates back in those days...

oh hey there Vanderbilt mansion.

And I also decided that I love the east coast for one reason: every thing is green. I mean, seriously, just about every where you look is green! It makes me feel like I live in a desert. but honestly, I loved it.

my future house is going to look just like this. not even this big, just with the cute blue shutters. that's all I ask.

this lady was MAKING LACE. lace. being made. by hand. call me crazy, but it was a shock for me. and so cool.

I have a pretty great family, huh? (:

This family vacation was the best! One thing I noticed, however, was that I've become so used to stars gazing this summer that looking out our hotel porch at the ocean at night was disappointing because you couldn't really see the stars. I think I've truly fallen in love with looking at stars because this summer, I've star gazed with friends {or by myself} a few times every single week. I'm just hoping Provo has stars, or I may just move home and become a bum! {I'm only semi joking.}

Sincerely,
Erica Michelle

boston {part 1}.

As soon as we flew into Boston, I knew I would love it. I mean, look at this view...

We rented a beautiful, super old {in a good way}, brick town house right on Boston Harbor.

The view from the porch was absolutely stunning! I spent every single breakfast {while we were in the house} watching airplanes take off. it was quite fantastic really!

The middle picture is the view of Boston from our porch at night! The other two are from different days. I swear, Boston is the prettiest, cleanest city I've ever been to!

In case you didn't know, we took this trip with my Aunt {Mom's sister}, Uncle, and 2 of my cousins {Adam and David}. Danielle, and Ryan and Tiffany flew in for part of the trip!

I took these pictures as we were leaving on the Whale Watch!

We only saw one whale on the trip, but we did get to spend a good few hours cruising on the ocean! So it was definitely worth it... at least I thought so. David and Adam weren't quit as enthusiastic (;

We also got to visit the Boston Temple and do baptisms! The temple was quite amazing!

although the photos were not as amazing...

Next came the seafood. And ohhhh how it was delicious! We ate at quite a few seafood places, and ever single one was to die for. PLUS I had my first legit lobster dinner! {and I promise, as delicious as lobster is to eat, I will never again order a lobster where I have to crack it open, and each it while still seeing its eyes and antennas. it was a bad situation.} I also had the best clam chowder AND salmon I have ever had in my life. no joke.

I know that I'm completely messing up the order of events, so I'm just gonna roll with it! We got to tour both Harvard and the JFK Museum! Both were way awesome (:

YMCA!

And Harvard was all fancy and stuff... don't worry, I got an acorn to take home. It shall forever be known as my Harvard Souvenir.

Well, I feel like that's a long enough post for now! Next is my first real baseball game, cape cod, touring mansions {imagine downton abbey} and the USS Constitution!

Best. Vacation. Ever.

Sincerely,
Erica Michelle