'Twas the night before Christmas

As a kid, I wrote a bazillion versions of the classic Christmas poem, 'Twas the Night Before Christmas. I stumbled across a few of them this year while decorating for Christmas. I figured I would share one for your viewing reading pleasure:

'Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house, we ran around naked and sat on a mouse.

The Christmas tree was old and falling apart, and my grandpa sitting by the fire, was acting like a fart.

The children were all down watching t.v., but I really needed to take a pee.

I ran in the bathroom, and to my delight, I saw a fresh roll of toilet paper, my first joy tonight!

Then I heard a big noise coming from the kitchen, I ran to the room and saw Santa's reindeer Blitzen!

He scared me to death, so I ran and screamed; this was not at all the night I had dreamed.

I ran to my wife and told her what I'd seen; she didn't believe me, she thought I was nuts, it seemed.

But I knew what I'd seen and I wanted to prove, but when I took her to the kitchen, that reindeer Blitzen had moved!

Gee, I was mad, lots of anger arising, I wanted to prove I was not hallucinating.

Gee whiz! I was mad, my anger arising, I threw a glass bowl, the results were quite frightening.

I ran to the window as my wife screamed, "Look at what you did, you ruined the beans!"

I felt terribly bad, but had no time to lose, I had to find that reindeer, no time to choose.

I ran out of the house and looked onto the roof, and what did I see, but that dumb reindeer... or was it a moose?

I guess I had been mistaken the whole time, that moose wasn't Blitzen, no way it was Dime.

I felt really stupid, I felt really dumb, cuz the whole time I thought that a reindeer had come.

It was just a mean neighboor playing a trick, and I thought it was a reindeer that belongs to St. Nick.

I went to my wife and told her the joke, she came outside, saw the moose and said, "You silly bloke!"

"You thought the whole time this was one of Santa's reindeer? You have a wild imagination" she said, "and I fear,"

"that you have need of some Christmas cheer."

So we went inside and had a drink, then we played a few games til I started to stink.

I was losing every game so I said, nodding my head, "I'm pretty dang tired, let's go to bed."

The end.

All this pushing the envelope has given me a papercut: Yes, I will be wearing pants on Sunday!

Have you heard about Pantspocalypse? No? What?! You don't have your smartphone attached to your hip so you can check Facebook compulsively every five minutes like me? Good for you. I really am need of some help when it comes to that matter.

But in all seriousness, I would like to address many of the thoughts that have been going through my mind for the last few days as a result of what many have termed "the pantspocalypse." Let me give you a quick explanation and timeline:

At some point during graduate school, a friend posted a link to a hilarious blog post that you will find here. It was my introduction to The Mormon Child Bride aka Stephanie, a woman whom I have since grown to admire and respect a great deal.

I found that initial post about Bently at the perfect time. I needed a break from the stress of writing a zillion papers for my greedy, research hungry monsters professors. I also needed to know that I was not the only one questioning my beliefs when it comes to how women fit into the LDS church. I spent the next hours (much to the dismay of my grades) reading nearly all her posts and feeling this incredible sense of peace. "I am not alone."

Rewind a couple of years and you will will find me in a UVU classroom absolutely enchanted by my Gender and Crime class. I mean, I knew about the reality of sexism, but my lack of formal education about patriarchy and feminism left much to be desired. That semester was probably the most eye opening experience of my life. Not only was I getting my groove on in Hip Hop, rocking the darkroom in Photography 101 and writing silly limericks in Creative Writing, but I was also being opened up to just how powerful "white privilege" is in my Race and Minority Relations class and taking field trips to the prison to meet women that I would later work with. Needless to say, in the end, I was converted.

To feminism that is.

Within in the church we sometimes hear converts say that when they find the church, they feel like they are coming home. What they learn and discover about the gospel feels familiar to them. We say that this is because we did, after all, exist before this life and we had the gospel in its fullness. So it makes sense that it would feel familiar. In a way, I feel this way about my feminism. It was always there, I just didn't have a label for it. Or an educated way to talk about it. But it was there, and oh, so familiar.

After I read about Bently and blogstalked my heart out, everything was different. So when I read Stephanie's recent post about starting All Enlisted, a Facebook group "for brainstorming ways to faithfully and peacefully advance feminist causes within the church," I was all in. I mean, 90 percent of my life is already devoted to Facebook (just kidding! kinda...) so this was the perfect way for me to find like minded people who before now I didn't really even know existed.

And then I read about The Pants.

More specifically "Wear Pants to Church Day" which will be taking place (for me) in T Minus 8 1/2 hours. You can find more information on the event here. Unfortunately, the original Facebook page was taken down due to the extremely abusive nature of many comments (mostly opposing the event) which included death threats aimed at the administrators of the group.

Yes, you read that correctly. Death threats. Unbelievable. Because of PANTS.

Of course, I joined the event and I am extremely excited to wear pants to church tomorrow in support of this "movement" which is aimed at peacefully drawing attention to gender inequalities within church policy/culture/doctrine and opening up a dialogue so that these things can be discussed openly and honestly.

I haven't been to church in months, so I was a little nervous about showing up sans a skirt. Believe me, I feel passionately about women being allowed to wear pants over dresses. If you don't believe me, you can read this hilarious rant. But I have plans to attend the baby blessing of a family member tomorrow, and I knew that my choice would probably not sit very well with many of the family members in attendance. After posting my support for the event on Facebook, one such family member came unglued and made sure I knew how "ridiculous" this was, and how "disrespectful" I was being by choosing to wear pants on the Sabbath.

While this was not unexpected for me (I know my family are VERY conservative/cultural Mormons), I think what happened on the event Facebook page was quite unplanned. If you happened to come across the page before it was taken down, you might have seen the incredible backlash that it ignited. In reading through fellow Mormons' negative comments, I was incredibly disheartened and appalled by the behavior of those who consider themselves followers of Christ. Initially, my gut reaction to all the hatred and judgement was to swear. A lot. I will not lie, I got incredibly worked up and heated over it. And I thought to myself, do I really want to associate myself with people and a church so full of hatred towards their own people?

Cries of "apostate" rang out, and commenters were encouraging those in support of the event to "just leave" the church if they didn't like it as it currently stands. Yeah. That's real Christ-like. You claim to have a monopoly on Salvation, yet you are telling me to walk the other way because I have a slightly different opinion than you. Hmm. Sleeping in sounded WAY better than sitting in a room full of these people.

But then the Facebook page was taken down and I turned to the All Enlisted page. I found words of encouragement and peace. I found not only a call to wear pants on Sunday, but a call to love and be patient with those who have openly expressed their hatred for us and all we are trying to accomplish. I felt the spirit, something I hadn't felt in the months I was attending church before I slipped into my current status of "inactive." I realized that I still was not alone, and I strengthened my resolve to stay and "fight the good fight."

There have been a lot of misconceptions that have come along with the purpose behind wearing the pants. I really like the explanation given in this article. Everyone participating has their own personal reasons for doing so.

I would like to share mine:

The most heartbreaking thing for me was going through the temple for the first time. My relationship with God/the church has had many ups and downs over the years, especially when I was a teenager. But despite my doubts or annoyance about church policy/culture/doctrine I have always felt that the gospel is true and I've never been able to fully walk away from it.

After my son was born and I placed him for adoption, I went though the incredibly difficult and humbling process of repentance and felt so strongly about going through the temple and the wonderful peace and blessings I would find there. Instead, my first time through, I questioned everything I thought I knew.

On top of the whole ceremony being extremely different than I thought (let's admit, for first timers, it's flat out WEIRD... for me even borderline creepy), I felt a complete absence of the spirit. I know the wording of the ceremony might seem to most as a trivial thing, but it left me feeling scarred and empty.

For awhile after we got married, I tried going back. I figured that like many said, it took going back a lot to truly understand the symbolism and the ordinance. But the few more times I went, I almost felt worse. I heard the same hurtful things repeated and it broke my heart. I felt like I was in a way being cut off from God because I was required to go through my husband to reach him and I just could not see the logic or fairness in that.

Sadly, I haven't been back to the temple in quite awhile... The excuse after awhile was that I was SO busy. Which was true. Grad school is a very demanding beast. But I also just couldn't bear to go back only to leave feeling empty and dejected yet again. I almost didn't even renew my temple recommend last year when the time came. Not because I wasn't worthy, but because I almost didn't even care anymore. The temple wasn't the place of peace and solace that I was counting on. It became a source of question and doubt.

The temple is at the center of our religion. In it we find the keys to our own personal salvation. To have this experience was devastating for me. Even the very House of God I found soul crushing (far from perfect!) patriarchy. Talk about a faith crisis.

Unfortunately, my repertoire of defense mechanisms involves getting really angry, and shutting down (hence my tendency to swear like a sailor). So instead of searching for answers within the church to my questions, I just stopped caring/coming. Until now.

I have been inspired by the many women (and men!) I have found who have grappled with similar issues but remained visibly faithful and steadfast in their devotion to the church. These are not apostates, they are "true believers of Christ." And I stand beside them with all my heart.

Which is why tomorrow I will be wearing pants to church.

christmas card making shenanigans

I love getting mail.

Ok, so that's a HUGE understatement.

Maybe that's why Christmas cards are one of my favorite holiday traditions. Even as a kid I would get so excited over every colorful envelope I got to open.

Last year I was so INSANELY busy that I didn't even send out Christmas cards. I almost cried. Lets face it... I died inside a little bit.

I eventually got around to creating a "new years" card on Shutterfly which I ended up posting here and on my facebook page so I didn't feel like such a Christmas failure.

I really enjoyed the design of the card because it appealed the list-lover in me--highlighting our top ten moments in 2011.

In my online search for an awesome (free) Christmas card template, I came across a blog (through pinterest) of Amanda Jane Jones who has created AMAZING "Year in Review" Christmas cards for herself and others. (Exactly what I was looking for!!!)

The best part? She just happens to be doing a giveaway! So I'm crossing my fingers and praying that I win! Click here to go to her website and see what I'm talking about.

Zen-ed out.

At the beginning of 2011, I bought two of those "page-a-day" calenders. One was a compilation of "jokes you would never tell your mother," the other was full of  Zen quotes. After a few months, I stopped ripping off a page each day... I know, I know, that is the whole point. Let's just say, things got crazy what with graduate school and all, so my daily joke and daily inspiration went way down on my to-do list.

Anywho.

Those calenders both sat on my nightstand until a few weeks ago, when I went through a little hypocleaning/organizing phase. I finally decided to dust them off and go through what I had missed out on in 2011.

Some of the jokes were pretty funny, but most were just stupid. However, I found a few gems in the way of the Zen quotes. Here are my favorites:

"For it is sufficient... to live by experience, without subscribing to beliefs."- Sextus Empiricus

"Our eyes were originally right, but went wrong because of teachers."- Zen Proverb

"If the only prayer you say in your entire life is 'Thank you,' that would suffice."- Meister Eckhart

"There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle."- Albert Einstein

"Death is not the biggest fear we have; our biggest fear is taking the risk to be alive--the risk to be alive and express what we really are."- Don Miguel Ruiz

"My father considered a walk among the mountains as the equivalent of church-going."- Aldous Huxley

"A paradox is only the truth standing on its head to attract attention."- G.K. Chesterton

"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication."- Leonardo Da Vinci

"Make your work your play and your play your work."- Phil Jackson

"In order to swim one takes off all one's clothes--in order to aspire to the truth one must undress in a far more inward sense, divest oneself of all one's inward clothes, of thoughts, conceptions, selfishness, etc., before one is sufficiently naked."- Soren Kierkegaard

"You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions."- Naguib Mahfouz

"Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared."- The Buddha

"Our true home is in the present moment. To live in the present moment is a miracle. The miracle is not to walk on water. The miracle is to walk on the green Earth in the present moment."- Thich Nhat Hanh

"Seriousness is an accident of time. It consists in putting too high a value on time. In eternity there is no time. Eternity is a mere moment, just long enough for a joke."- Hermann Hesse

"Facts are the enemy of truth."- Miguel Cervantes

"Awareness is therapy per se."- Fritz Perls

"Be soft in your practice. Think of the method as a fine silvery stream, not a raging waterfall. Follow the stream, have faith in its course. It will go its own way, meandering here, trickling there. It will find the grooves, the cracks, the crevices. Just follow it."- Sheng-Yen

"We are visitors on this planet. We are here for ninety or a hundred years at the very most. During that time we must try to do something good, something useful with our lives. Try to be at peace with yourself and help others share that peace. If you contribute to other people's happiness, you will find the true goal,  the true meaning of life."- The Dalai Lama

"Seize from every moment its unique novelty and do not prepare your joys."- Andre Gide

"The fundamental delusion of human beings is the belief that we exist separately and independently form the rest of the universe."- Reb Anderson

things I will never understand...

For starters...

The world's obsession with foam soap.

I mean, who comes up with this stuff?! Are we really so lazy that lathering our own soap takes too much work?

I can just feel the germs mass multipling on my hands after I use the nasty stuff.

Can you say gross?

Another thing that baffles me is...

Why people wear these "pants" by choice.

And I'm using the word pants very relatively... As if you could really call these things that. They are more like tights.

I mean, it's bad enough to see the top of girls' ass cracks when they bend down in their ridiculously low jeans. But now this?!

Are girls really not concerned that they are flaunting their ENTIRE crack to the world?!

Gag me.

This next one really makes my head spin...

People who feed an entire cake to their children on their birthday when they turn 1.

I mean, just six short months ago the poor kid was barely introduced to "solid" foods. Now you are encouraging him to pig out on a dozen adult sized helpings of sugar on steroids?

No wonder more and more American children are becoming, obese!

Another thing that has me shaking my head is...

Shorts that are so short the front pockets hang out like so:

When I first saw this horrible fashion trend, I thought the poor girl was using some old jeans to make cutoffs and just didn't realize that by cutting them so short she was being tacky.

Boy was I wrong!

Turns out that letting your pockets hang low is not only socially acceptable, it's encouraged.

And of course this post wouldn't be complete without....

People who stop three car lengths behind the person in front of them at a stoplight.

I mean, really people???

This one never ceases to baffle me.

Is our depth perception really THAT off, or are we just too busy texting while driving to notice that a huge diesel could sneak in front of us?

Hmm... am I the only one who missed the boat, here?

Hair today, gone tomorrow.

Lately I've decided that I want to chop my hair off.

I'm sick of seeing myself look the exact same way in every picture:

It's not flattering.

But because I'm not willing to sacrifice three hours a day for the sake of beauty, I'm not able to look this good all the time:

And let's not forget how obnoxious it is to keep clogging our drains with all my hair that has decided to fall out post-baby.

Ew.

Hair freaks me out, so having it all over the bathroom/house is completely revolting.

Not to mention the fact that Miles LOVES my hair. If it doesn't all fall out by itself, he has made it his personal mission to pull it all out which is exponentially more painful.

So what else is a girl to do?

I wish I could march right into the salon and walk away looking like this:

 or this:

 but instead I would come out looking like this:

and that is a sight that no one should ever be subjected to.

My long awaited summer reading list.

When Miles was born and Brett stayed at home with me for the first week, we got addicted to the Game Show Network, particularly Family Feud.

Although I watch a lot less TV now that Miles is older, I will still cross my fingers and check GSN for our beloved show once in awhile while Miles is eating or napping, or when I'm just having a really bad day and need a pick me up.

The other day, during the "fast money" round at the end, one of the questions was: "When was the last time you read a book?"

The first guy's answer was "3 months ago." The second lady's answer was "1 month ago."

WHAT THE HECK?!?!?!

Are there really people out there who read so little? The thought absolutely SADDENS me. (Probably more so because I know it's probably true.) There is nothing better than curling up with a good book. Well, aside from having a sleeping baby, that is.

Although the summer is almost over, here are the books I will snuggling up to in the upcoming days/weeks/months (and some that I have already finished since school got out):

 And the few from last summer's reading list that I didn't quite get to:

 What's on your summer reading list this year?

Summer Bucket List Part III

Wow.

The summer is nearly over (*cry*) and I still have yet to create my traditional summer bucket list. I guess better late than never, right?

I've also decided to keep my "never ending to-do list" separate from the my CRAZY FUN bucket list. That way when I look at it, I don't get depressed and overwhelmed like I did two years ago after returning to this.

Unfortunately, there were some things on last summer's bucket list that had to be given up due to the fact that Miles was growing inside of me (eew!). So let's start by transferring those to this year's list and actually making them a reality...

1. Lagoon with friends.

2. Sunday bike rides. (Ok, really this will now have to be walks because last summer we dug our bikes out of the shed only to realize that the tires are un-pumpably flat. Either that or we are both just too stupid to operate the tire pump, which is also a likely possibility.)

3. Lose 5 pounds and 2.5% body fat. Oh wait, let's make that: lose 20 pounds and as much body fat as possible!

4. Camping and paintball with the fam.

5. Get both cars deep cleaned. (Yeah, I think last summer I was just too lazy for this... Not sure how much of that had to do with actually being pregnant...)

Wow, that was a lot to carry over. Now let's add fun things to the list that we've already done this summer. Is that ridiculously lame and pathetic? Well in case you haven't seen me lately, I've pretty much become ridiculously lame and pathetic.

6. Carnival fun.

7. Take Miles to Seven Peaks a bunch.

8. Warped Tour!!! (You can read all about it in one of my previous posts.)

9. Fourth of July festivities in Milford.

10. Double date nights with the sis and cousins.

Now let's finish this thing off with a bang!

11. Take Miles to the beach for the first time.

12. Swanson family reunion fun in St. George.

13. Eat tons of snowcones (BTW- best snow cone shack ever is at the Will's Canyon Stop just before Provo Canyon. $1.50  gets you the world's biggest snowcone. Brain freeze, anyone?)

14. Finish reading the Hunger Games series with Brett, along with the rest of my summer reading list (which will likely be the topic of my next blog post).

15. Hike somewhere that has a waterfall.

16. Campfire and s'mores.

17. Picnic at the park.

18. Swapmeet at Coalville.

19. Watch the olympics on t.v.

20. Try to start conquering my ever growing and never ending to-do list (also likely to be one of my next blog posts).

Is there even enough of the summer left to enjoy such delights? I sure hope so.

Hope for humanity.

Lately my days have been feeling pretty empty and meaningless. Can I just tell you how bad I hate being a stay-at-home-mother?

But then I stumbled across this blog via my newest addiction, pinterest.

In case you are too lazy to go to the link, it's a blog describing how to put together "blessing bags" to give to homeless people. I read a lot of the comments on this particular blog post (I know, I'm one of THOSE people), and I have to admit, I have mixed feelings about these "blessing bags."

For one thing, if you are going to truly help a homeless person, you shouldn't shove free deoderant in their face, you should give them a place to take a shower and sleep for the night. I wish I had the guts to offer every homeless person I saw my spare bedroom. Alas, there are far too many truly freaky people out there (most of which are not actually homeless), and I'm too poor to afford a hotel room for everyone I see holding cardboard signs next to Wal-Mart.

While all of the things in these goody bags are given as a nice gesture, I still feel that they are somewhat demeaning. I feel like the message they communicate is:

"I don't want to touch you with a 39 1/2 foot pole, but I still want to consider myself Christian so I'm going to give you a Bible and some things from the dollar store to improve the quality of your life. Of course I won't give you money, because everyone knows you will spend it on drugs or booze. I definitely won't take more than 30 seconds out of my day to help you any further, but throwing this bag at you from the window of my pimped out Escalade makes me a good person, right?"

I truly hate the stereotype that all homeless people are drunks and druggies who will spend any money given to them on booze and cocaine. In a lot of the comments on the blog, people talk about putting giftcards to Starbucks or sticking a mere quarter for a phone call in the "blessing bags." Don't actually give them money!!

What if the person hates coffee? What if they have no one to call? That quarter could maybe get them 5 M&Ms from a candy machine at the local Jiffy Lube.

Who are we to judge and say how they will spend money? I'm reminded of a scripture that was pointed out in one of my classes during the first semester of my masters program. I can't remember if it was from the Bible or BOM, (and I'm too lazy to try and find it so I actually look credible), but basically it said that you should just give the poor the money, and let them do with it what they will. That is how you get blessings, folks. Not by judging God's children and witholding because you  think you know what is best for them.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to get after people for trying to help the homeless. I think it's just the BIG thinker in me that gets irritated when people try to do something so SMALL to solve a problem that deserves so much more attention than a trip to the dollar store and a family home evening putting together ziplock bags of goodness.

In fact, that's why I have mixed feelings about this idea. Because somehow, even though I really like the motto, "Go big or go home," I still know and believe that sometimes you have to start small, and that little things do add up to big and miraculous things.

And because I want my children to change the world, I want to start small with them when they are small; helping them create a little "blessing bag" for a homeless person while educating them about the issue of homelessness and showing them how to love and help everyone (in small and big ways) could be a great way to do that.

Gah. I just can't make up my mind. I told you I had mixed feelings about this.

On a more optimistic side note, stumbling across this idea did remind me of the few times I've found a glimmer of hope for humanity in the last few years...

...When the guest staying at the Abbey Inn (during my days at the front desk) gave me $100 bill in an envelope with a kind note telling me to "put this towards your big day"after overhearing me talking to my coworker about how stressed I was about paying for my own wedding cuz I didn't want my parents to worry about the money.

...When people driving by the lemonade/snowcone stand my sister and I manned every summer in front of our house growing up would stop and buy a glass to enjoy in their perfectly air conditioned vehicle and tell us to "keep the change" from the $5 bill they handed us. -Side note- A few days ago, Miles and I were walking home from the grocery store and a couple boys were selling bags of cherries on the corner. It felt so good to give them a $5 bill (the cherries were $1), and telling them to keep the change!

...When I lost my sister's camera in a mosh-pit at the Big Ass show, someone actually responded to the "missing" ad I posted on KSL about it and returned it.

...When the lady at the store bought my husband "Ernest Saves Christmas" because he was telling her how much he loved it while they were in the checkout line.

I guess "little" things really can be "big" things after all.

The Best of Warped Tour.

Saturday I enjoyed what will probably be my last Warped Tour for awhile. Somehow frying in the hot sun for ten hours is losing its appeal. Either that or I'm just getting old.

Although I didn't make my way through the crowd to mosh with the best of them (as is my usual tradition), I still enjoyed the day, chillin' in the shade with my awesome bro, listening to some kick ass bands from a distance.

Since I am a sucker for nostalgia, I figured I would do a tribute post to highlight the best of Warped Tours past:

July 17, 2004 Year One.

Bands:

Alkaline Trio, Anti-Flag, Bad Religion, Bouncing Souls, Coheed and Cambria*, Flogging Molly, Letter Kills, Motion City Soundtrack, My Chemical Romance, New Found Glory, NOFX, Senses Fail*, Story of the Year*, Taking Back Sunday, The Casualties, The Early November, The F-Ups*,Thursday, Yellowcard*.

After having some car troubles at Betos (and having to be jump started by some random guy), my best friend, Hillary and I finally got on the road. We got completely lost, but eventually made it to the fairgrounds. After waiting in the world's longest line to get in, we made it through the crowd to hear Story of the Year, who, may I say, SUCKED live. I was majorly disappointed, as they were one of my favorite bands at the time. Nevertheless, we still had an amazing day. We met up with my crazy friend Luis

who introduced us to Senses Fail,

who played an amazing set, for the record.

Highlights:

Meeting The F-Ups. After listening to them rock out on stage, we hung out with them back at their tent and giddily had them sign our Warped Tour programs. Ha.

July 16, 2005 Year Two.

Bands:

The All American Rejects*, Armor for Sleep, Big D and the Kid's Table*, Billy Idol*, A Change of Pace*, Drop Kick Murphys*, Fall Out Boy*, From First to Last, Gogol Bordello*, Greeley Estates, Halifax, Hawthorne Heights, Hidden in Plain View, Horrorpops*, Matchbook Romance*, The Matches*, Mest, Motion City Soundtrack, MXPX, My Chemical Romance, The Offspring, Relient K, Reggie and the Full Effect*, Rufio, Senses Fail*, Silverstein, Simple Plan*, The Starting Line*, The Transplants*, Underoath.

Highlights:

Meeting The Matches (pardon my poor editing out of the world's dumbest ex-boyfriend who hogged the photo ops all day)

Rocking out with A Change of Pace

July 22, 2006 Year Three.

Bands:

The Academy Is...*, Anti-Flag*, The Audition, Billy Talent, The Bouncing Souls*, From First to Last*, Greeley Estates*, Hellogoodbye*, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts*, Less Than Jake, The Living End*, Motion City Soundtrack*, NOFX*, The Pink Spiders, Rise Against*, Senses Fail*.

-side note- I swear we also saw Cartel.

Highlights:

It was my birthday!!!!! And my BFF Brent came with me this year.

Wearing this awesome shirt I made that was the hit of the day. SO many people talked to me, I felt so cool. Haha.

Immediately after arriving, rocking out to an amazing band (Greeley Estates) and passing out from exhaustion afterwards.

Meeting an amazing new band (The Sunstreak), who gave me a free shirt and signed CD because it was my birthday. We rocked out to them later at a small stage, which was sadly the only time I've ever been able to see them live!

Getting an Anti-Flag shirt for my BFF Hillary for her birthday, because she wasn't able to come to the show with me this year.

Rocking out to The Living End who were crazy mo-fos on stage.

Having the world's worst sunburn that hurt so bad I couldn't wear a real shirt for days afterwards!

July 7, 2007. Year Four.

Bands:

Anberlin*, Bad Religion*, Big D and the Kid's Table*, The Matches*, New Found Glory*, Pennywise*, The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus*, The Spill Canvas*, The Starting Line*, Yellowcard*.

Sadly, I could not find any picture evidence that we actually went to this year's show, although I do have a ticket stub to prove it.

Highlights:

It was Missy and my new (at the time) boyfriend Brett's very first time at Warped! (Although according to Brett, this was the first year I started being lame at Warped Tour and not getting into the crowds for every band.

June 28, 2008 Year Five.

Bands: The Academy Is...*, Anberlin*, Angels and Airwaves*, The Audition*, Greeley Estates*, Reel Big Fish*, Relient K*, Story of the Year*, 3OH!3*.

Again, no picture evidence that I could find, but we were there!

Highlights:

We had seen 3OH!3 in Vegas when they were on tour with Sum 41. They were ridiculously hilarious and crazy on stage during that show, which got us into them. This year at Warped Tour, we enjoyed seeing their theatrics again on one of the smaller stages.

Hearing "Wrong the Right," an F-Ups song blaring from a smaller stage and sticking around to catch a drumstick from the band  who turned out to be Hang 'Em High. After the set, we went and talked to the lead singer, who turned out to be Travis, the lead singer of the F-Ups! He was telling us that after The F-Ups broke up, he and his brother and some of the former members of the band had reformed and became Hang 'Em High. It was crazy, awesome to run into him! Of course he signed the drumstick I had caught, and had all the band members sign it too.

While walking around, we found a booth with a bunch of "Streaker" stuff, and realized it was one of the guys from The Sunstreak. We talked to him for awhile and found out they were trying to record new stuff but were having issues with various labels, so they were trying to make their own.

August 8, 2009 Year Six.

Bands:

A Day to Remember*, Bad Religion*, Big D and the Kid's Table*, Escape the Fate*, Less Than Jake*, Medina Lake*, NOFX*, Scary Kids Scaring Kids*, Senses Fail*, There for Tomorrow*, 3OH!3*.

 --don't ask me what the eff I'm pointing at...

Highlights:

It was Jared's first year at Warped!

Rocking out to Medina Lake and then meeting them aftewards.

Being extremely disappointed in 3OH!3's performance. Now that they had gotten big, they no longer put on their fun, dorky show.

~We skipped 2010-2011's shows, because there weren't enough good bands going to make it worth our while.~

June 16, 2012 Year Seven.

Bands:

Anti-Flag*, I Fight Dragons*, New Found Glory*, Senses Fail*, Taking Back Sunday*, The Used*, We the Kings*, Yellowcard* You Me at Six.*

Highlights:

Leaving our own little rocker at home for the day was hard. One day we will bring him with us to shows.

Feeling like a celebrity when I got asked to write on the "Fears Vs. Dreams" board and get my picture taken at the TWLOHA tent (because I was wearing my old TWLOHA shirt).

Bringing my brother Ammon to his first Warped Tour and rocking out to one of his bands, I Fight Dragons.

Chilling in the shade as much as possible (while being dorks of course).

Seeing people walking around with these

on their bodies, and finally finding the tent they were getting them from which just so happened to be Streaker Records (I knew it!). We talked to Jason from the Sunstreak,and found out they successfully created their own label, and have put out another CD since their EP. Awesome! We also got to listen to one of their new songs which was sweet.

Spotting the drummer from Yellowcard walking around with his girlfriend towards the end of the day. I SWEAR I've seen him in the most random of places every time they come to town!

And of course I can't forget our famous Warped Tour traditions!!!:

-Picking up Texano burritos from Betos to eat on the drive up.

-Parking for free at the Chinese buffet across the street from the fairgrounds (although this was the first year they had people enforcing paid parking in that lot, so we parked down the street in front of someone's house instead...)

-Being so wiped out at the end of the day, that we almost die of exhaustion.

All in all, Warped Tour has been a huge part of my life. I have discovered new bands, and rocked out to some of my old favorites. Although we may not go back for a few more years, here's a toast to the memories!


*=bands I'm at least 99% positive we saw. Sadly in my old age, I'm losing my mind and can't guarantee that we actually made it to see the rest of the bands listed (although I'm pretty sure we saw most of them).