My Kindred Spirit

My best friend, Becca is finally back after departing for India back on December 27th. Our reunion was filled with hugs, coffee and marveling at how much we missed each other and love each other. She brought me back a beautiful scarf she purchased in Darjeeling and authentic Indian bangles. She knows me too well!

A Spearfish Kind of Friday Morning

Where: The Green Bean (my favorite coffee shop in all the land)

Company: Jackie Miles

Accompanying Music playing through my owl headphones: Adele station on Pandora
- Look for a post on these headphones at a later date!

Drink: Blueberry Pomegranate Fruit Tea Blast (the very first blogpost featured this drink, which is quite possibly the greatest thing ever!)

Task: Completing a really crap-tastic English midterm before we journey to Deadwood this afternoon and reward ourselves with jewelry purchases

Starting Early

Everyone in my family is a big coffee drinker. Case in point: Brytten has been fueling up since she was 4! It used to stun waitresses when a little toe-headed blonde girl with freckles ordered coffee. Well I am starting on the youngest member of the family. On Thursday I picked Camille up from daycare and we went to Caribou. While she only had a White Chocolate Hot Chocolate she is well on her way to mastering the coffee-shop vibe. We had a lovely afternoon.

She is such a pro!

A Wednesday for the Record Books

Today was just absolutely wonderful and I am extra-cheery despite the rainy weather which normally is so not my thing. Some people would be annoyed with me today because as several of us were walking to take our chemistry test this morning and were complaining about the rain hitting our faces and eyelashes, I decided that I love it when my coffee has a splash of rain water. Think there would ever be a "Coffee with a Hint of Rain Water" Keurig blend?

Then I got my 35-page art history paper back that consumed my life a week ago and I got a great big ol' A on it! At that point nothing could have tampered with my great day, but it continued to get even better!

Jackie and I went to see "Footloose" at the cheap seats and besides it being an awesome movie and totally falling in love with the new Ren (even though I will always love Kevin Bacon), one of my greatest dreams came true! For as long as I can remember I have wanted to be at a movie where there was no one else in the theater. It finally happened today! And with my best friend Jackie, which made the experience even better!

This was quite possibly the best rainy day and best Wednesday ever!

Wunce Upon a Time

My mom and I are still at Coffea but this seems like a blog-worthy post. Brytten is about to take her first college final and is going in to the momentous occasion with what sounds like about two pots of coffee in her little self. She has called my mom and I, as she says, "literally 27 times." These comical conversations have included her telling us that the back fell off of her desk chair but now it makes a nice makeup stool, she made our grandpa do his first pinky promise, and she almost fell out of her bed because her blankets started rolling and she was in them. All of this has been said at about five times her normal speaking rate.

She needs a burger.

These very Brytten-like interactions prompted my mom and I to share our favorite Brytten-isms. My personal favorite is when I came across one of Brytten's papers from when she was in about 8th grade- as in way too late in life to make this mistake. She started her story with, "Wunce upon a time."

That's right... Wunce.

Here is Brytten in all her glory.

16th Birthday Celebration

Wunce upon a time, Brytten knitted.

She is going to hate me for this... 

Prep Work

It is Monday between the hours of 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. which means that I am sitting at Coffea with my mom alternating between homework and my blog. Because most days I would much rather delve into my blog than study for my upcoming finals.

I was going through all my photos that have been taken within the last three years to prep for a post I have had planned for months. Ooooh the suspense! Look for it the first day of Christmas break, Wednesday the 21st. While doing the prep work I found this photo from one of the first outings that Abbie, Kaycee and I had from freshman year!

Half a Year

Today marks the 6th-month anniversary of this blog. On the first day I blogged I was sitting on the deck of the Green Bean, my favorite coffee shop in Spearfish, drinking a Blueberry Pomegranate Iced Tea Fruit Blast and listening to Coldplay. I was wearing shorts, a tank top and flip flops. Today I am sitting in my Solberg dorm room looking out to the campus sidewalks dusted with snow while drinking a cup of coffee with cinnamon and honey and listening to U2. I am wearing jeans, a sweater and boots.

It is incredible to think about everything that can happen in six months and I am sure I could babble on and on about all of the amazing-ness that has been the last six months including the adventures I have had, the exciting opportunities that have come my way and the never-ending feeling of love I am blessed to experience from a huge assortment of people. Instead I will present a sort of photo narrative.

June

Being 'Good at Summer' at the fish hatchery during my summer internship

Finn and I at the top of Harney Peak 

July

The day we became fans of rodeos! 

Camille and Grandpa on Duck Day

August

I climbed mountains! 

I have a married friend!!!

September

Four ladies at Touch of Europe

My lovely friends

October

She was truly the most deserving queen!

Queen Jackie and her royal court

November

Me and Leah and some November hiking!

Sam, Camille and I at Augie

I am sure some wonderful moments await me throughout the month of December!

June 6th-December 6th
6 months of Good at Summer!

It's a Coffee-Filled Life

I hate to admit this but I just made an hour-by-hour to-do list for the next three weeks. And although yesterday I posted that it would probably be the last time I blogged for about a week, I obviously lied. I have half hour time slots for blogging scheduled on that ridiculous to-do list.

These last three weeks of the semester are going to be intense but will be greatly rewarded with six whole days in Spearfish that will be spent with family including John's sister, Jeni, hiking, snowshoeing and horseback riding. Christmas break will be planned according to a fun to-do list of exploring Spearfish with John and the dogs, reading oodles of non-textbooks, napping, helping Grandpa finish the duck house, decorating Christmas cookies with Grandma, and finding the Lucky Green Care Bear ornament (don't worry, I already have a blogging session scheduled for that one) and coffee dates with friends, including Laura Hey whom I will get to see for the first time since May 21st!

As if the gods of overwhelmed college students heard my prayers/pleas I received a package today with four, count them FOUR (!) boxes of coffee my grandpa ordered for me! Also in the mail was my Anthropologie catalog. I even etched in another time slot to flip through the catalog, most likely while drinking a cup of coffee.

Last night and this morning in the very wee hours before dance team, I chomped on the childhood snack of celery and peanut butter. The crunch combined with what I consider a food group will keep me going these next few weeks!

Thus pictures of what my life will consist of until Wednesday, December 21st at noon when I hit the road for Spearfish with new roadtrip playlist cd's for Mamacita and I!

Peanut butter, Celery, Post-it Notes, Adele Pandora Radio Station

Ginormous amount of coffee and lovely candlesticks in the Anthropologie catalog

La-La-La Monday

Many of my Monday posts have been about the music I listen to while at Coffea for my Monday-Coffee-Date-With-My-Mom. Well, this week "Running to Stand Still" by U2 has been playing on repeat for several hours. And for good reason. It is absolutely beautiful.

So as I prepare for this week which includes writing a 25-page paper for my Art History class, I realize I probably wont get a whole lot of blogging in. Or I shouldn't, anyway.

Thus, I will leave you with this song until I can take a breath again. U2 creates phenomenal music that is actually music and this is one of my new faves.

The title of the song even seems appropriate for the next and last three weeks of the semester.

Running to Stand Still

And so she woke up
Woke up from where she was
Lying still
Said I gotta do something
About where we're going

Step on a steam train
Step out of the driving rain, maybe
Run from the darkness in the night
Singing ha, ah la la la de day
Ah la la la de day
Ah la la de day

Sweet the sin
Bitter taste in my mouth
I see seven towers
But I only see one way out

You got to cry without weeping
Talk without speaking
Scream without raising your voice

You know I took the poison
From the poison stream
Then I floated out of here
Singing...ha la la la de day
Ha la la la de day
Ha la la de day

She runs through the streets
With her eyes painted red
Under black belly of cloud in the rain
In through a doorway she brings me
White gold and pearls stolen from the sea
She is raging
She is raging
And the storm blows up in her eyes
She will...

Suffer the needle chill
She's running to stand...

Still.

Mondays with Mom

Over the weekend while admiring the horses that reside at the Black Hills Equestrian Center I realized that God might have made a mistake and given me horse hair rather than regular people hair. My mane and the horses' are strikingly similar. I also dubbed a new word to describe my hair- flizzly. It isn't necessarily frizzy but it definitely isn't straight and smooth either. Thus, because of my flizzly hair and ungodly lack of hair product, I am rocking a ballerina bun for about the eighth day this month.

I was feeling majorly moderately depleted today when my mom picked me up for our Monday coffee date. There are a whole lot of stressors which is extra frustrating after having such a wonderful, stressless weekend in Spearfish. My mom has a subtle way of just doing her "Mom" thing and making me get my Sanna-groove back. Today in Coffea, we were doing our traditional Monday activities of drinking coffee, talking about life and love, while I work on homework. Eventually my mom noticed a girl around my age smiling at us. We guessed she probably missed her mom. We are just that adorable together. I came back to Augie feeling slightly more whole with some wounds healed.

I have not yet mentioned the massive actual wound that I acquired grinding flour to make wheat bread with my grandpa- how else? I managed to install insulation and use a staple gun and hammer in nails unscathed, yet when it comes to being domestic, I acquire a big, bad, and downright ugly blister. Seriously, this is a doozy. When I went to get a band-aid from my grandma to repair the palm of my hand she instead had to find cuticle cream for that problem. I still need a band-aid...
Anyways, growing what feels like five layers of skin back is rather painful and I have to wash my massive amount of hair with only one hand. I guess it is all part of building character.

Over the weekend my mom gave my sister and I very distinctly picked-out earrings. Brytten's are very Brytten-like and mine are very Sanna-like. I like having someone who knows me so well especially when it comes to making me feel better - so much so - that I stand up straighter. It takes a lot for me to not stand up straight but when it does happen, my mom is there with an invisible rod behind me to keep me upright. She also picks out B-E-A- uuuuutiful earrings.

Coffee and Notes

Life is short, Stay awake for it.
I love the tidbits printed on the cups at Caribou Coffee. Here are my latest favorites:

"Making the best snow for it town."

"Wheel'n and deal'n at garage sales."

"Riding a tandem bike with my love."

"The nights that turn into sunrises."

"Fresh raspberries from my garden."

What do you stay awake for? 

I think my answer is different for the nights I willingly choose to stay awake and the nights I so don't want to be staying awake. And those two are supremely different from why I stay awake on the nights I am on duty!

Musical Monday Musings

I finally did it! I found the perfect Pandora station and what do you know? It's the Adele station. Not so shocking considering how much I LOVE Adele! It is the perfect compilation of the likes of Adele, Duffy, Ingrid Michaelson, Jack Johnson, Franz Ferdinand, Vampire Weekend, Landon Pigg, Joy Williams, Norah Jones, Sara Bareilles, Florence + The Machine (my other absolute favorite), and Justin Nozuka.

One of the best songs presented by this station was a rendition of the King's of Leon's song, "Use Somebody" soulfully sung by Laura Jansen. It's definitely a new fave. My favorite Ingrid Michaelson's song on this station is her version of Elvis Presley's, "Can't Help Falling In Love."

This station was so lovely because I was excited for each new song that would play and they all made me smile. Good music does that.

This station made for a great day anyway but to top it off today was quite possibly the most beautiful last day of October ever! In order to celebrate the sunshine and get a much needed dose of Vitamin D to run out my cold I went for a jog through the nature trail at the Outdoor Campus. I frequent this trail a lot and this time there were more leaves scattered on the ground which made a lovely crunch as I ran through.

After my run I stopped and got what will probably be my last Passion Fruit Iced Tea for a few months. Perfect way to journey into November!

Here are some of the best songs from the Adele station:

Broken- Jack Johnson

Make You Feel My Love- Adele

Take Me Out- Franz Ferdinand

Rumour Has It- Adele

And The World Turned- The Gabe Dixon Band

A Punk- Vampire Weekend

Mercy- Duffy

Falling In Love At A Coffee Shop- Landon Pigg

One Of Those Days- Joy Williams

1901- Phoenix

Many The Miles- Sara Bareilles

Dog Days Are Over- Florence + The Machine (This will always and forever be my absolute favorite 
song!)

I'm Scared- Duffy

After Tonight- Justin Nozuka

Bottle It Up- Sara Bareilles

Oh-Maha!

Yesterday I took full advantage of having four wheels to my name and road-tripped down to Omaha for the day to visit Ashleigh, one of my last-year-girls who now attends UN-Omaha and Rachel, one of my best friends from high school who attends Creighton. Besides for my little detour through Iowa when I got slightly lost - which turned out to be quite lovely because I found myself on a picturesque back highway lined with fall colors- the drive was quite relaxing. I had a little jam session and dance party with myself the entire way.

When I finally got into Omaha I had a coffee date with Ashleigh at the "half-Scooters, half-bank" in Old Market. I then had awesome sushi with Rachel at Blue also in Old Market. We sat in black leather couches and everything and I had one of my favorite things ever (!) - green tea ice cream.

I had originally expected to have all sorts of time in Omaha but instead I spent more time with Ashleigh and Rachel thus I didn't get any pictures taken for this blog and didn't purchase anything to show pictures of, which was probably a blessing on my bank account. However, I have some pictures from another trip to Omaha from a couple years ago that show why I love that area so much!

Fall Hiking

I naturally go a little stir crazy but this semester has been even worse because of my crazy busy schedule and the fact that I was so active and always outside during the summer.

Thus, it was a huge relief that today Carl and I went hiking at the Palisades. Crunching on leaves is good for the soul, I have decided.

Mountain Man 

It was a beautiful day and perfect for a hike and smell all of Fall's smells. On that note, my car may now permanently smell like coffee because of the almost entire cup that spilled on the floor of my passenger seat. But, really what else would I want my car to smell like?

Sanna Night

Last night was joyful bliss. It was my much-hyped-up Sanna Night and was absolutely delightful. I had grapes, a large Chai, gummy hamburgers, popcorn, Glamour magazine, face pampering scrubs, and movies to watch with my Mamacita. And then I slept without an alarm set for the first time in nearly three months!

I had to instruct freshman boys to erase male anatomical drawings from white boards but that didn't deter from my wonderful night!

The making's of a Sanna Night

WOAH!

Viking Days week is finally here and in an attempt not to get too overwhelmed I am looking to blogging! I have also realized that this week I will be living on coffee and spoonfuls of the jar of peanut butter that will always be in my backpack.

Yesterday I was studying with my friend Megan (check out her awesome blog http://meganphotography-megan.blogspot.com/). Some studying did happen but I also set up a tumblr account http://thejoyfultrek.tumblr.com/.

As I was leaving Caribou I said "Goodbye girlie" to one of my girls from last year that recently started working at Caribou. Then I got a text from my friend Becca saying that she just saw me which didn't make sense because I thought she was still at school at St. Ben's. Surprise! She came home for the weekend and I finally got to see her! We hadn't seen each other since May 22nd right before we left for different parts of the country for the summer.

I might need some 'not-so-funny' humor like this during this next week...

Triangle

My mom and I had a moment today that would only happen in my family. We were sitting at Barnes and Noble and she gave me a credit card with a little over $5 on it. She explained that this was the last of the child support money that we would ever receive. This became a comical situation (thank god because otherwise it is super depressing to think about) and she gave me the money to spend on coffee to which I responded, "Ooooh I will put honey in it!"

Such a Sanna thing to do but it is also quite metaphorical. Whenever I need a little boost in my day/life I put honey in my coffee in addition to my normal cream and cinnamon. I like that you don't truly taste the honey until the very last sip. Life is like that. We know that something great is coming and when it does, it is perfect. Through everything that my mom, Brytten and I have been through I have always maintained the slightly Polyanna-like thought that the next wonderful thing is just around the corner. And it always was.

Monday with Moxie

When I was little I had an American Girl pocket-sized book with buzz words. One of the words was moxie and it has been one of my favorite words since. I like to think that I have moxie and it helps in my day-to-day goal of surprising people. It really has nothing to do with a Monday except for creating an alliteration- my favorite part of speech.

Today my mom and I had our weekly Monday coffee date and she shared some of her pictures taken from our front stoop and at the Grands' house with me. Here are some of my faves.

My grandpa and his ducks

Me at Scooters. Moms always catch us at our nerdiest...