March Madness

     If there’s one thing that I love just as much as Café Rio or cookie butter, it’s March Madness. In the Hardy family, March Madness is taken very seriously. Even when I was just seven years old my family would compete with one another to see who could create the best bracket. Some people remember their father sitting next to them at the dinner table helping them with math homework, but my father sat next to me as he helped me make my selections. When I was still learning to write, my dad would sit next to me and say, "Okay Rachel, who do you want to pick to win: Southern Illinois or St. Mary's?" I would then ask him important questions such as what their uniform color was and where they were from, and then he'd write down my answer. We filled out my entire bracket like that. During the games, my dad would circle the teams I picked right and crossed out the ones I picked wrong.

    Knowing this, you can probably imagine the sheer horror I felt when I was finally turning the page of my calendar to March and realizing there simply was too much to do, none of which had to do with basketball. So, in the spirit of the Madness, I created a bracket and got to work.

Getting a real person job: I am excited to graduate. Really, I am. Unfortunately, when I pulled out an old list of goals I had made for myself back in young women’s, the last thing I put was ‘go to BYU.’ That was it. My 13 year old self could name all the Mary-Kate and Ashley books to ever exist, but somehow failed to plan anything after college. So I decided it was time to get a real person job. However, attending job fairs (which is an experience similar to walking into the mall where the men at kiosks try to convince you that you NEED a nail buffer)  and sitting through class discussions on how to ‘sell yourself’ in interviews was a little much for a girl who recently took off ‘pet sitter’ from her resume.   

Finding an Apartment: Now that we’re almost graduated, Emmie and I decided it was time to look for a place to live in the fall. Some of you may be thinking, “Wow, they’re sure getting on that early.” WRONG. Apparently the time to look for that was during my preschool days, because all the places we wanted to live are full. After we realized this, we lowered our housing expectations and searched again. Still full. We lowered our expectations and searched again. STILL FULL. It got to the point where instead of asking management companies if they had covered parking, my only question for was whether or not my other roommates would be tarantulas. I thought I was handling the stress of being homeless quite well until I started stopping people mid-conversation, frantically asking, “Where do you live?!” Now I understand how criminals are so misunderstood.

Teacher Work Sample: In the elementary education program, your senior capstone project is called the Teacher Work Sample. When people ask me what this is, I explain to them the process of retrieving, calibrating, and synthesizing data in ways that expound and nurture my students’ minds. Usually once I’ve gotten into 10 seconds of my spiel, they get so bored that they stop paying attention, which is a good thing since I’ve run out of big words by then. Really I just use big words because people think teaching elementary school is merely finger painting, but the teacher work sample is actually a project where you teach a unit and then analyze your data for 80 pages. Many of the girls in the program posted a picture on their social media page of their finished project, crisp off the printer in a nice labeled folder. Some posed in front of the McKay Building, gracefully announcing their swan song. My picture, however, was a little different.


Teaching: I am now student teaching in a sweet 4^th grade class. In this case, the word ‘sweet’ is defined by the girl who came up to me during class and said, “Miss Hardy, why do you always wear the same clothes? Either you wear that shirt with oranges on it that makes you look like a farmer, or you wear your business woman shirt.” Like my relatives, my students are constantly concerned about my dating life, with students leaving me notes such as this one:

 

 

One of the best things about teaching is that even if you do dress like a farmer, the students still think you’re awesome. As I walked my students out to recess, the two walking closest to me decided that they would be my bodyguards. I didn’t realize how serious they were until one of my other students came to ask me a question and a bodyguard jumped between us, wielding a stick, screaming, “STEP AWAY FROM THE PRINCESS!” My bodyguards now follow me out to recess every day and ask what tasks I want them to complete, so it’s the elementary school experience I always wanted. When I saw my bodyguards were scratching their arms to mark themselves as my chosen ones, I told them they were taking it a little too far, but secretly I now totally can see where Voldemort was coming from.

Game Show Hosts: Last weekend a good friend from the ward texted me and asked me if I would like to be a game show host. Since my true life goal is to steal Ellen Degeneres’s show, I said yes. I co-hosted Provo’s own Science Safari with my good friend Bobby. We became Ranger Rachel and Safari Bob as we tried to teach kids about different types of animals. (I used the word ‘try’ because occasionally I read my script wrong and tried telling the kids that a snake could run faster than a lion. Whatever.) The good news is that they let me use a head set like Britney Spears. It is still unknown whether or not there were Ellen talent scouts in the audience.
 
Amid all this craziness, my brother called me last Friday. I asked him how he was and he said he was feeling pretty down. Immediately I knew it was a family emergency. In that moment I was ready to run to my car and drive all night to be wherever my family was. I asked my brother what was wrong. “Well,” he said sadly, “Louisville won. You picked that right, and I picked that wrong. It’s messing up my bracket.” And then, for the next hour, we stayed on the phone discussing games and stats.  

Life’s a little crazy, but if I could make every month of the year March, I would.

 

More Sleep, Less Selfies

    Daylight Savings Time left many people waking up exhausted and groggy. Many people use it as an excuse for anything. You woke up late? It's because of Daylight Savings. You want to go to bed at 7:00? Daylight Savings. You didn't empty the dishwasher? Daylight Savings. That person you really like but have never talked to didn't profess their love to you today? That darn Daylight Savings! This seems to last for the rest of March as people liberally blame all their woes on a loss of an hour. Everyone complains about losing a precious hour of sleep. However, I never miss an hour of sleep. Instead, I choose to lose an hour of something useless or boring. Why miss an hour of sleep when you can miss an hour of your second cousin's girlfriend's neighbor's baby shower instead? Here are a few things I suggest skipping before you skimp on your sleep:     

Eating Healthy Food: There are thousands of articles saying that celery is a negative calorie food, because it takes so many calories to chew that you don’t even gain any when you eat it. That’s pretty cool, unless you actually try to eat it. Celery takes way too long to eat. It’s way too crunchy and loud, and I would starve to death before finishing an entire stalk. The same goes for carrots. To save time, eat something less time consuming, such as cookie butter. This can be conveniently eaten by the spoonful and it’s one of my all-time favorite joys in life. When I was first introduced to it, I came to class the next day and informed the other people sitting around me that something life changing had happened to me. My professor overheard me and announced to the class that I had a big life event happen that he wanted me to share with the class. A few gasps were heard as people thought I was announcing a mission call or an engagement. I spent the next few minutes discussing the discovery of Speculoos’s Cookie Butter from Trader Joe’s. Needless to say, I felt slightly embarrassed for the girl in my next class who stood up to announce her engagement.

Using unneeded materials: Eat ice cream straight from the container. Drink milk straight from the carton. Eliminating scooping ice cream and washing the bowl will save you at least 37 seconds of time.

Selfies: I will be the first to tell you that YOU are beautiful. You're a wonderful person, and you are probably really great at coming up clever hashtags. #SelfieSunday? That's true poetry right there. #FlashbackFriday? No one is as good with alliterations as you. However, I firmly believe if you sacrifice one or two solid selfies a month, you can catch up on that hour of sleep. If you’re lucky, someone will snap a picture while you’re sleeping and caption it, “Caught the bae sleeping. #SleepingBeauty”

Trying to have Super Powers: You are super. You can do super things. You can smile at people and make people feel good about themselves and stand up for what you believe in. You can hold open a door or write a thank you note. If you’re Kyle Collinsworth and are reading this, you can break the NCAA record for triple-doubles in a basketball season. Go Cougs! The point is, you’re super and can do super things. That being said, stop trying to force your super powers and see MULTIPLE COLORS OF THAT DRESS THAT DESTROYED THE INTERNET. 

Changing the Clocks: Because of Daylight Savings, every 6 months time is spent finding all the clocks you own and changing them to the right time. When I was a wee child (see also: last year) I didn’t know how to change my clock in my car. Instead of reading the user’s manual in my car, I just left it for 6 months until the time was correct again. At least 2 minutes of my life was saved. (It would’ve been 5, but time was lost during those six months trying to remember what the time actually was.)

Throwing Valuable Items Away: When President’s Day rolled around, Katherine and I decided we wanted to celebrate it right. Everyone kept posting pictures of their Valentine’s Day celebrations, but hardly anyone remembered to post a picture of their favorite Founding Fathers! Unfortunately, our carefully hand crafted President’s Day costumes were nowhere to be found, so new costumes were made.

After taking all these steps, you’ve probably saved at least SEVEN hours, so go do something great with them. (In this case ‘great’ means leaving Café Rio burritos on my doorstep.)     

I'd Rather Have a Yacht: A Valentine's Day Guide

    Many people have very specific feelings about Valentine’s Day. Some people love it, some people hate it. Some sit at their homes hoping that an attractive individual they’ve never met is going to ring their doorbell with a bouquet of flowers, and others spend their time weeping through the pages of Twilight. It’s an odd holiday. I, for one, am fairly indifferent. Certainly I enjoy a good holiday, particularly if it includes free chocolate and people watching at the grocery store where grown men are trying to decide between buying a 4 foot tall stuffed owl holding a sign reading, ‘Owl always love you’ and a ginormous stuffed toad with a sign reading, ‘Valentine, you’re toadly awesome.’ However, I do think celebrating a holiday that features a baby with a bow and arrow is creepy and also incredibly dangerous. There are people out there who are spending hundreds of dollars to “baby-proof” their homes with window locks, stove top knobs, and baby gates, but no one seems to bat an eye when they see a picture of an infant with a stick sharpened enough to spear someone. Whatever. Because I would consider myself to have a very successful love life (I once sat through 24 minutes of A Walk to Remember, I spoke more than 4 words to a male in June 2011, and someone once left me a stuffed bunny on my porch, which was probably from my young women’s leaders, but there was no name on it so there is no proof it wasn’t from a boy) I decided to create a list of tips for celebrating this Valentine’s Day.

Tip #1. If you’re single, avoid getting defensive. For every unmarried, single adult, there are 57 married adults asking why they’re not married. Questions like these are often followed with observations of what’s exactly wrong with said unmarried person and advice that is usually as helpful as a lifeguard yelling down to a drowning swimmer to ‘swim harder.’ My personal favorite was when someone told me to at least try to get married this year. If you don’t have a sense of humor, it’s easy to take offense to comments like these. While filling out my taxes, I came across a page where I had to state whether I was married or single. Next to the question read the words “Explain this’. EXPLAIN THIS? EXPLAIN why I’m not married? I began to tick off the reasons: I’m so intelligent I make others feel like dullards. Similar to the sun, my beauty is blinding to others. No one wants to marry a person who would rather travel via elephant than car. In the middle of creating my list, I realized that the ‘Explain this’ portion of my tax form was probably not a free response question, but an explanation for people who get confused when filing their taxes.

Tip #2. Whether you’re single or married, everyone should stop using the word ‘bae.’ For those who aren’t familiar, bae is a word meaning ‘before anyone else.’ People have started using it to describe their significant other, but the only time this word is appropriately used is when saying, “Pizza is bae.” (This is used when your mouth is full of pizza, preferably of the deep dish Chicago variety, and saying “before anyone else” is impossible.)

Tip #3. Some people take Valentine’s Day seriously. Respect that. Every February while in elementary school my mother purchased a box of Valentines cards for me to address to each student in my class. No matter if they were Spongebob, Harry Potter, or Spiderman cards, I always made sure to read the prewritten message on the card carefully and decide which friend should get which card. After all, I wasn’t going to give the boy I secretly liked a card with a secondary character like Hagrid on it that read, “I hope your Valentine’s Day is magical.” Saying something like that is equivalent to someone writing the acronym for ‘have a great summer’, ‘HAGS’, in your high school yearbook. Instead I firmly believed that my crush deserved a card with a main character displayed on the front with a clever and flirty saying such as, “You’ve put a spell on me, Valentine.” On the subject of cards, make sure there is candy on them, or it’s just a waste of paper altogether.  

Tip #4. Take good care of your Valentines cards. Regifting cards rarely works out. When I was in the fifth grade, I gave out Finding Nemo cards, very carefully addressing a very thoughtful card with the fish, Dory, on it to the boy I liked. When it came time to drop each Valentine in my fellow classmates’ boxes, I realized I couldn’t find that particular Valentine. I panicked. Valentine’s Day would be a waste without that card. Desperate times called for desperate measures. I grabbed a Valentine I had previously addressed to someone else, scribbled their name out, and wrote the name of the boy that I liked on the card. To this day I firmly believe the reason we’re not married is because instead of a funny Dory card, I had to give him a card with the clown fish, Marlin, on it, probably next to an ultra-lame and unromantic saying.

Tip # 5. If you’re going to spend your Valentine’s Day feeling lonely and unloved, find a Valentine. This first step is learning to talk to the opposite gender. (Please refer to the image above featuring my incredibly intelligent brother) If you’re going to spend your day alone, but not feeling lonely and unloved, the great news is that you don’t even need to learn how to interact with other individuals! All awkwardness is suddenly gone.  

 

Tip #6. There’s something about Valentine’s Day that makes people obsessed with the shape of a heart. Just because it includes hearts, people think it makes a great gift. Don’t buy a gigantic stuffed penguin just because it’s holding a heart. Time doesn’t need to be spent cutting your sweetheart’s sandwich into a heart, because then there is less sandwich to eat. Heart shaped boxes filled with chocolate taste the exact same as normal boxes of chocolate. Conversation hearts are disgusting. Better gift ideas: large sums of money, a helicopter, or a pet elephant. (If you’re really insistent on the heart shape idea, you can probably ask the elephant to make his trunk in the shape of a heart.)

Tip #7. Before you post something on social media think to yourself, “Do I really mean this?” Valentine’s Day is filled with Instagrams of red roses, engagements rings, and chocolates, all captioned with “I couldn’t be happier.” I fully endorse people being happy. However, could you really not be happier? A more realistic Instagram caption would read, “I am so happy my boyfriend brought me these roses. Nonetheless, I could be happier if he bought me a yacht. #blessed”

HAGS and Happy Valentine’s Day!

Hooked on Phonics: Life Lessons from the 1st Grade

Dear Hooked on Phonics,

I would like to demand a refund. Sure, my mother never actually purchased your educational materials for me, but I watched enough of your commercials explaining your products with goofy xylophone duets going on in the background that I firmly believe I’ve learned all I need to know from your program. I believed this, of course, until I actually had to teach a phonics lesson and realized I don’t even know what phonics is. You see, I’ve spent the past month student teaching in the first grade. My teacher asked me if I could teach a phonics lesson about the long o and the long u sound.   

Easy, right? WRONG. I was only 2 minutes into my lesson when I realized that I had no idea what I was teaching and was in the middle of a detailed hate mail to the American colonists for not making their own language when they founded their own country. This situation made me reflect on life. Is phonics really even important? No. Phonics is not important for first grade. After you make this groundbreaking discovery for yourself, your whole world will feel like it’s falling apart, just like your company. Never fear. Sure, phonics isn’t important, but there’s lots of other very important things people need to learn. There are lots of educational videos to make that have nothing to do with phonics. Here are just a few things that I’ve learned from first grade that should be included in your new curriculum:

1. Humans are born with a certain set of skills. You don’t need to teach an infant how to breath. You don’t need to teach infants how to use their incredibly high voice box to keep everyone awake all night long. One of the skills that humans were not born with, however, is the ability to use a paper clip. During a lesson I asked my students to take the cards they were using, put them in a pile, paperclip them together, and bring them to me so we could move on to the next part of the lesson. One minute went by. Two minutes. Five minutes. MILLENIUMS. I walked over to a child to see what was taking so long, and was horrified to see one hand holding papers, one hand holding a paper clip, and the two constantly running into one another, and if smashing them together hard enough would fix the problem. This skill is a necessity, folks. If six year olds can’t handle paper clips, I’m pretty sure they can’t master subject-verb agreement.  

2. First graders should be taught a lot of words, including but not limited to the words unicorns, ice cream, hot air balloons, and bicycle. First graders, however, should not be saying the F word. I had the privilege to teach a darling class. When I read my morning message to them, they were darling. When they went to recess, they were darling. When I taught them math, they were darling. When I walked them to lunch, they were darling. When I was being observed by my mentor teacher who was grading me on my lesson, there’s a kid saying the F word. The great news is that on the observation sheet there is no space to dock a teacher on allowing children to corrupt others around them. (The bad news is that there’s probably a spot on the observation sheet to note that I laughed for hours afterwards.)

3. Honesty. First graders tell it like it is. One day at school my student said to me, “Miss Hardy, my grandma would like what you’re wearing today.” And then I stared at her, and she stared right back at me, and that was all that needed to be said. The outfit was never worn again.

4. Lying. First grade taught me that you can use dishonesty to make other people feel like the things they’ve done in life are ALMOST as cool as what you’ve done. After telling a student I go to BYU, she said, “That’s cool. I also went to BYU. Except I was two years old when I went.”

5. Speaking of lying, they’ll believe anything you say. Even if what you say is, “Of course your sunflower seed will grow! I gave you dirt, seeds, and water, so why wouldn’t it?!” Let me tell you why it wouldn’t: the teachers did not prepare the soil beforehand AS DIRECTED ON THE SOIL PACKAGE. I hope all those parents enjoy having a cup of dirt sitting at their house for the next 80 years waiting for something to sprout.

6. First graders do not understand the difference between a comment and a question. One minute you’re explaining about the concept of fact families and asking if anyone has any questions, and the next you’re sitting through a three hour story of how one girl went with her family on a cruise to Cabo.

7. First graders are under the belief that they can take over the world. Upon seeing that someone  had accidentally mixed up the daily schedule and put music in front of math, a girl pounded her fist on the desk and said loudly to the class, “We need to change the daily schedule. WHO’S WITH ME?!?” Suddenly I had a raging rebellion on my hands. (Rebels that don’t know how to use paperclips, of course.)

8. Pinterest and Google with catch on to the fact that you’re a teacher. After googling the best ways to teach missing addend and pinning fun fact family games, the “pins recommended for you” section no longer includes jet packs and cookie butter, but instead color wheels, strategies to teach counting, and an Idiot’s Guide to Functioning in the World.

9. Teaching is like living on a comedy show. In the middle of a lesson you ask a student why they’re crying, and they explain to you that they’ve been staring straight into the lights for the past 10 minutes. Soon half your class is in tears and your favorite F-word saying student is frantically commanding everyone to put their arms above their foreheads to create shade from the ceiling lights.


I loved working with some of BYU's best and brightest student teachers! 

10. Kids know exactly what to say. One morning I came to school feeling particularly sad when a girl came up to me and told me I was beautiful. They make sure to keep you nice and humble as well. While I was turning a jump rope for my students during recess, they requested that instead of chanting jump rope rhymes, we sing the songs from Frozen as they jumped. (Things I would rather do instead of singing Frozen songs: eat lima beans, run a marathon on heated coals, or parallel park) But, because they requested it, I belted ‘Let it Go’ for the whole playground to hear. One of my students told me afterwards, “I think you’ll need to practice singing for a month or two before you become Elsa.”

11. First graders are happy. When I asked my students what they wanted to be when they grew up, one boy said, “I want to be a worker at Krispy Kreme!!” and the rest of the students shrieked in agreement. They’re not worrying about making lots of money or dieting or who they’re going to marry or what their major should be. They’re not worried about making eye contact with a person you kind of know but not well enough to say hello, and they’re not worried about global warming or if children should be vaccinated. They’re just finding something that makes them happy and being just that: happy. When I took my students to recess, I noticed my favorite student (Yes, I have favorite students. Obviously it was the kid who said the F word) was playing alone. I felt bad, figuring he was lonely, until I saw him strike a pose in the middle of the blacktop. All of a sudden he started spinning and jumping, waving his arms around like a Kung Fu Master. He lunged, he sashayed, he leapt, fighting imaginary zombies wherever he went. On his face was one of the biggest, happiest grins that I’ve ever seen. There he was, having a solo dance number in the middle of a hundred kids. The next time I don’t want to do something because I’m afraid I’ll look stupid, I’ll remember him, and do it anyway.  

12. Above all else, everyone should spend some time teaching in the classroom. There will be nights where you stay up until 3 in the morning modifying the perfect text about giraffes so your students can actually understand what they’re reading. There will be hours and hours you spend teaching the students the vowel combinations to make the long o sound, and one girl will still raise her hand and claim that the letters ‘ta’ make the o sound. But at the end of the day, the six year old that swears like a sailor will come up to you and wiggle his fingers into yours and say, “Miss Hardy, I love you. You should go to the office and get my mom’s phone number. Then you can come over to my house and we can play.” Moments like that are certainly more important that knowing phonics.

I hope to see my refund in the mail soon in either cold hard American cash or butterscotch brownies.

In the utmost sincerity,

Rachel

 

 

State of the Union

     

On Tuesday evening I sat down to watch President Obama’s State of the Union Address. Apparently this is what mature adults do, or at least adults whose tv shows have been postponed for the address. I’ve watched parts of the address with my parents before, but never have I sat down to watch the entire thing. The first fifteen minutes or so was our president shaking hands with lots of other important people, so by the time he finally spoke I was more than ready to hear every word. Unfortunately, as soon as no more than 10 words came out of President Obama’s mouth, the crowd erupted in cheers. The clapping went on for a moment, and then the president said another 10 words. Again, applause rang through the capitol. After a minute or two the cheers were silenced. Barack opened his mouth again. Not only did he say one sentence, but TWO sentences! The crowd erupted into cheers and THERE WAS A STANDING OVATION. I repeat: THERE WAS A STANDING OVATION DURING THE FIRST MINUTE OF THE SPEECH AND NO ONE EVEN WON A TRIP TO THE BAHAMAS. Don’t get me wrong, I like a good standing ovation as much as anyone else, but I was beginning to think that Barack had planned seven minutes worth of speaking and had allotted 49 hours towards cheering. Fortunately the crowd started to let him speak more, he was able to say more than 12 words without fireworks going off, and he delivered a great address. However, as I was watching the cheering I thought to myself, “If I was President, I would make sure there would definitely be no clapping at my State of the Union Address.” Then I realized that if there would be no clapping at my address, I would actually have time to speak to America, so I wrote down exactly what I thought American needed to know: (Note: I tried to email this to Barack as he was standing at the Capitol, but he must not have had his iPhone on him)

First, I would start off by giving the country the Webster’s dictionary definition of the word ‘America.’ (I’ve learned from every youth talk during Sacrament meeting that this is the only way to start a talk.) There will obviously be no applause, but I will pause .078 seconds for a small chortle.

Next, I will talk about the great advances in technology that we saw during 2014. The most important, of course, being the pulley system. (For those Americans who are uninformed: my kitchen window faces the kitchen window of our neighboring apartment. We got together with them to create a pulley system between the two apartments using some pulleys, a strong cord, and my adorable flower girl basket.) Next to visiting my parent’s home, this has proved to be the easiest way to accumulate free food. Not only are all my neighbors nice, but they’re also good cooks. Unfortunately for them they probably saw the error of their ways the day the system was installed and in exchange for heavenly homemade egg rolls, our apartment offering were blackened cookies that were supposed to be cooked for 7 minutes, not 7 hours. Nevertheless, trade and technology is going well on that front.  

Now would be the time to make promises. Politicians get a bad rap for promising things they’ll never do, so I feel like if they’re going to lie they might as well lie big. During his address President Obama talked about making community college free. I think this is awesome, and I’m all for a more educated country. However, I would not only try to make community college free, but I’d also give every American a free jet pack. How else will people get to college or work? (There’s probably some political minded person out there thinking, “Rachel’s just using satire when she’s suggesting giving everyone a jetpack because she really thinks that sending people to college for free is incredibly expensive and absurd sounding.” WRONG. Jet packs are just super awesome, and so is college.) After this little bit of my speech people will be very tempted to jump from their seats and applaud, but I will wait only .49 seconds for people to breathe in excitedly before I move on.   

My next item of business would be to get rid of the acronym POTUS, which apparently stands for ‘President of the United States.’ Upon reading it the first time on Twitter, I thought it was either a bill waiting to be passed or a deadly disease. This will be the part in the speech where people suggest new names, hopefully with someone suggesting ‘Queen Rachel.’

After that, I will move on to the thanking portion of the speech. This is similar to the Academy Awards, where I will thank my mom, dad, siblings, friends, teachers, and all my peers who created and filled out class google docs during my time at college. The next optional part of the speech will include the unthanks, where I will unthank all those who did not vote for me and the pizza man who promised my pizza would be delivered in 10 minutes and instead arrived in 30. (That part of the speech will only be given if rotten tomatoes have not already been thrown.)

Following is the fact portion, where I will spew off facts about our country, making sure to end all sentences with “…or is it?!” and a loud cackle. For example: “The tax rate is going down….or is it?!?”

After all is said and done, I’d make sure to remind the citizens of the country how wonderful they are. Sure, there are people who lie or cheat or steal. There are people who will just take advantage of others and only look out for themselves. But the good people are outshining the bad. There are people out there that are buying lunch for the person behind them at the drive through, and there are people who are choosing to be honest. There are mothers and fathers everywhere whose first thought when they wake up is how to help their kids. There are people who will let you in on a busy lane on the freeway and roommates who randomly make your bed or text you to let you know they care. There are neighbors that are shoveling sidewalks and strangers smiling and Americans changing the world for better. Let that be you.  

And then, with no applause, I will take off in my jet pack through the secret skylight in the Capitol.

Now is the Time for Revolution

     Last week, as I was spending my Christmas break at my parent’s house with most of my siblings, the topic of Christmas cards came up. Every year my mom sends out a card and a letter, giving a little snippet of things each person in the family has done in the past year. Some Christmas cards have not turned out as well as others. For example, two years ago I sat down to read the card and read all about the incredible escapades of my highly intelligent brother graduating with his highly intelligent master’s degree, along with his highly intelligent wife, who were both expecting a highly intelligent son. I then read about my incredibly talented brother who was the president of an incredibly talented club. I then reached my paragraph of the letter: "Rachel is in her second year at BYU and majoring in Elementary Education. When she isn't spending time with family or friends, she is eating at Cafe Rio." THAT WAS IT. Apparently eating a Cafe Rio pork salad is equivalent in coolness to earning a master’s degree. The letter then moved on to talk about my next brother, who was also graduating, played with his band at Carnegie Hall, was getting his mission call, and solving world hunger in his free time. (In total honesty, this was the best and most hilarious Christmas card my mother has sent out.)

  Because I suffer from middle child syndrome, I obviously believe that my section should be the biggest and best part of the Christmas card. I will be the second person to rave about how talented and incredible my siblings are, (The first would be my great-grandmother, who before passing away a few years ago would insist that one of the Hardy children was going places, and it was definitely the youngest child. Upon receiving school pictures of us she praised me on how beautiful I finally had become. Tragically, I had to point out the picture was actually of my sister, and I still looked the same as always.) but I am always trying to figure out how to make my section a little bit more important. As I was discussing this with my siblings last week, my brother informed me that there was no way I would be taking home the bragging rights for 2015 because he's getting married. (The joke is on them, though, as I plan to insert myself in all of their wedding photos.) My sister did not take my brother's challenge lightly, and informed us all that not only will she be married to make it in the family card, but she will also have a child. I told them all that not only will I graduate college, but I planned to spend some time in jail as to really spice up the card. (Just to clarify, my sister and I were both joking. She will not be a child bride, and I will not be spending time in jail, unless my brother and his fiancée decide to sue me for photobombing all wedding photos.)

     I've never been very good at making New Year's Resolutions. Perhaps this is because the word 'resolution' and I have never been very agreeable with one another. (This is because as I child I gave a primary talk, written by my dad, all about making resolutions at the beginning of the year. I insisted that I would read my own talk, not stooping to the level of illiteracy of the Sunbeams. Unfortunately I had heard of the words 'resolution' and 'revolution' and figured they were the same thing. Wrong. So there I was, standing in front of the primary, telling the other kids that one of the prophets had counseled that "Now is the time for revolution!!" Fortunately I did not create a rebellion, but I did hear my family members laughing for the next 15 years.) However, I figured that if I wanted to reach my goal of being the best part of next year's Christmas card, I needed to shape up, so I've compiled a list.

     Rachel's 2015 Resolutions 

Do what you say you're going to do: One of my best friends, Emmie, loves Christmas. She got her advent calendar weeks in advance this year. Every time we went to the grocery store, she would tell me I needed to get into the holiday spirit and buy one. I informed her that I didn't need to buy one because I could make my own personal calendar. A bite sized piece of chocolate every day wasn't enough to get me excited, so I told her my own calendar would be filled with an apple pie one day, 3 bowls of ice cream the next day, a fresh batch of chocolate chip cookies the day after that, all coming up to Christmas day. I used this excuse every single time Emmie told me to buy an advent calendar, until one day she pointed out that my calendar doesn't work because I didn't actually eat all that food. This taught me the importance of doing what I say I'm going to do. In 2015 I will make an outrageous advent calendar, and I will eat the whole thing. 

When you start something, finish it: This past year Emmie and I went to dinner at a local Mexican restaurant, El Azteca. I told the cashier that I wanted the nachos, and we sat down to wait for our food. As we were catching up on the day's events, a small woman with a platter at least one and a half feet long walked out of the kitchen. She had a gigantic smile that covered her entire face and almost started laughing as she neared our table. She was carrying more than her weight in nachos, right over to my table. (Unfortunately the picture does not do the continent-sized platter justice) She laughed as she set it down on the table, and the cashier laughed from the front of the restaurant. Even other restaurant goers were pointing and laughing, because there I was, sitting behind a platter of nachos that could have fed a large mariachi band. Emmie and I got a pretty good laugh, and I hardly made a dent in them before I asked the waiter to get me 29 to-go boxes. This year, 2015, I'm going to finish what I start. I'm going to order the nachos and eat the whole thing. When I say I'm going to take a nap, I'm going to nap all afternoon. When I start watching a new show on tv, I will do no homework until I finish the entire season.

No Regrets: This is a year to live life with no regrets. After Thanksgiving, my mom sent me home with almost an entire pumpkin pie. It was heavenly. I had many delicious slices. Unfortunately, one day I put it in the back of the fridge along with a bunch of vegetables that I pretend do not exist. And then, like the vegetables, I forgot that the delicious pie was in my fridge. A few weeks later I pulled the pie out, mortified. I had ruined a perfectly good pie. I had taken all the sunshine in the world and had thrown it in the back of the fridge with a bunch of black tomatoes. Sometimes there's a voice in our minds that tells us that we're not good enough, and that we never will be. Sometimes that voice tells us that we're not pretty enough. Sometimes it tells us we're not smart or funny enough. The little voice in my head rings loud and clear, specifically on fast Sundays, screaming, "Remember that delectable pie you wasted?! You could've solved world hunger with that, you dummy!!" So then I go home and eat everything there is in the fridge, in order to not be wasteful. In 2015 I am NOT going to let that pie go bad, thus living life without regret.

I was once taught in a seminary class how to make and keep goals. The one particular thing that I remember is that it is important to reward yourself for keeping your goals. So, if I meet all my goals, I am going to have a banquet in my honor, on the moon, hosted by President Barack Obama. There will plenty of nachos for you all. Hope to see you there.  

Sorry You Didn't Receive the Gift that is Actually Nonexistent: A Christmas Gift Giving Guide

Do give coupons: Remember when you were in first grade and your school teacher helped you make coupons for your parents for free car washes and breakfast in bed? My parents thought they were so cute they wouldn't even use them, they just put them in the "cute things Rachel did, but not cute enough to put them on the fridge" pile. The great news is that these coupons never stopped being awesome! I still give a stack of coupons to both my parents every year and they are always greeted with "Wow!" and "I never would've guessed that this is what you would get me!" If you are good at ignoring sarcasm, they sound pretty excited. There are many benefits to giving coupons as gifts. Obviously it fits well into my college Christmas present budget, which is approximately $0.02 per family member. Another great thing is that my track record for my dad using my coupons is currently 0 for 389. I could promise to take my dad to the moon and would be in the back yard, busily preparing for take off and my dad probably wouldn't even use them. This is great because since they are never used, you can promise to do anything and never actually have to do it. Another great thing about coupons is that you can get really creative with them. It is not rare to give my mother a coupon granting her permission to take me to Hawaii, or letting my dad take me to Chicago to see a Cubs game. I have also been known to make coupons offering the service of my siblings, which usually goes over very well. (As long as "very well" means that my siblings get really confused but don't take me to jail for forgery.)

Don't buy something for someone that someone else wanted. When I was younger, I really wanted a life sized Barbie doll. I had seen them throughout the holiday ads and mentioned it to my parents, but as the financially responsible 8 year old I was, I realized it was way too expensive to expect under the tree. Christmas came and went, and I probably wasn't even very sad I didn't receive it because as a financially responsible 8 year old I most likely realized my parents were saving up for my college education. You know, just your mature 8 year old. A few Christmases passed, and my wish list changed from Barbies to things like palm pilots, since every 13 year old needs a good personal digital assistant. (You think I'm joking, but I got one and it totally rocked. I was rarely late to any play dates and I always knew how much my parents should tip the waiter.) The morning of Christmas, my little sister had a gigantic box to open. As she tore off the wrapping, there, in all it's glory, stood a life sized Barbie. And it didn't even have my name on it. I think my sister must have said something like, "Oh, well that's pretty cool." Pretty cool?!? Pretty cool!? Santa brings you a 3 foot Barbie doll with two different outfits and clips for her hair AND YOU JUST THINK IT'S PRETTY COOL?!? A gift my sister didn't even ask for. So there I was, opening up my digital planner and started my first journal entry entitled, 'Santa can Apparently Bring Worse Things than Coal, Like Broken Dreams.'

Do wrap your present in an even bigger box, and then put puzzle pieces in said box. This completely throws people off when they're trying to guess what you actually purchased for them.

Don't ever ask, "Well what do you think I got you?" This gives time for people to list off things that they actually wanted to receive from you, instead of the coupon you created for them granting them permission to do your dishes. Set low expectations.

Do think things through before giving a gift. When I am purchasing a gift for someone, I like to think, "Would the person I am giving this gift to use it to make my life miserable?" For example, my mother is a big fan of practical gifts. She loves receiving gifts that make her life easier, and doesn't really mind receiving household items. However, if my mom asked for a vacuum for Christmas, I would most certainly not purchase her a vacuum because then she would actually make me use it. It's important to remember everything is a risk, unfortunately. One year my mom mentioned she would like some Christmas-y dishes for the holiday season, so I made sure to purchase the dessert platter instead of the vegetable tray. Imagine my dismay when the day after the platter was opened it was used to hold carrots, none of which were covered in Nutella.

Don't forget to make/buy gifts for people you probably should give to. If you do, that person you forgot to shop for will probably stop by your house unexpectedly to give you a super thoughtful gift featuring everything you like in the world, probably costing 7 trillion dollars. You will then be forced to run into the other room, grab something from your stocking that Santa Claus just delivered to you, put a bow on it, and give it to your friend. Your family will be in the other room, laughing at you. This experience once again showed that my decision making skills start to crumble during pressure, joining the many times I've been walking in the dark and have started to run away from dark, dangerous animals that turn out to be people on skateboards.

Do talk up your gift if it can't be fact checked. More than once in my life, someone has said, "I can't wait to see what you got me! I'm sure it's awesome!" More than once in my life I have also explained that I have shot off fireworks or rented a plane to write in the sky, 'Congratulations!' or 'Happy Birthday!'. This is totally fine because it can't be fact checked. If someone said they never saw it, I explain how sad it was they must not have been looking at the sky because the gift was THE COOLEST THING EVER. This way the receiver of the nonexistent gift feels sad, not you, the thoughtless person that you are.

May you all give dessert plates that are used as dessert plates, and may you receive the life sized Barbie doll you always wanted.