TBT: Baxter the Rock

I am totally embracing the Throwback Thursday thing even though I'm about 5 years behind the times in doing so. First, I have a question: How old does a picture have to be to count as a 'throwback?' Hopefully not more than a decade because I don't have anything that old handy right now. 

Today I would like to reminisce, give a shout-out, hollaback girl (I'm told that doesn't work here - whatever), about my Physical Science class my Freshman year at BYU. Almost everybody at the university had one required semester of physical science or something equivalent to that. If you were working on prerequisites for the Elementary Education program you had to take two semesters, and the second semester was dedicated solely to rocks. Geology I guess, but rocks. Seriously. Rocks. 

Please direct your eyes below to view a picture of me with my favorite rock: Baxter.

I liked Baxter because he was a big one and he was pretty inside. The lab also had a massive piece of pumice, but it was ugly and poky and hurt my hands when I'd pick it up and carry it around over my head (it made me look like Wonder Woman, or just weird, but I was cheating because it's stupidly light). Most of the rock samples were very tiny and fit in tiny little storage compartments, but not Baxter. Baxter was huge.

My roommate took this picture our last night of studying in the rock lab before the final exam where we had to identify 100 rocks. Not pictured in this TBT post, but happened only moments later, is when my roommate shot some sort of chemical up her nose that is supposed to test the effervescence of the rock. It's a fond Freshman memory. (Not so fond is thinking about how many rocks I licked and how many other tongues were on those rocks.)

My TA for lab time was in love with rocks. She would disappear on little studies to various rockeous places in the world to study more rocks. I imagine her house is covered in rocks both inside and out. As I recall she was engaged, but I think she mentioned her fiance once when someone asked about the ring on her finger. Everything else she ever said was about rocks. 

Anyways, I spent more time around rocks that semester than I will probably spend around rocks for the rest of my life. I studied rocks like crazy, and I aced that stupid final exam. I now remember nothing. I'm not sure why they felt such an intensive study of rocks was necessary, but, oh, the times we had in that rock lab.

February 2014

February is one of the dreariest months of the year I think. Luckily, we had a few events that made it less so. We had a Valentine's party with my family in Mendon where we enjoyed the company of the Smiths, Logan Holdaways, Garrison, and my parents. I only got pictures of the party prep, but it was a nice little gathering. We had food (as is required at all Holdaway functions), lots of Valentine sweets, games, and chatter.

The master food prepper.

Angela was quite excited about this picture.

Not as cheerful as usual.

They weren't much help in the prep-work.

For the extended weekend my best friend Heather was up to visit. It's always nice to have the extra company, and I'm so grateful to have a friend willing to make the drive to come and visit. I don't make friends very easily and get lonely.

The next weekend Garrison came for a visit. Garrison, unlike me, makes friends easily and has them everywhere so he was in and out visiting people, but it was very nice to have him here to make us laugh and to play with Sprout.

Now to the Random February Treasures:

Sprout LOVES it when I work out while he's awake. He very enthusiastically pulls out my mat and rolls it out for me. He clambers all over me, weaves between my legs, and sometimes tries to mimic what I'm doing - especially if it involves legs. We have some funny videos, but I feel a little awkward posting videos of me working out on the internet. Here's a picture of him on Yoga day.

I love that he's reaching the mimicking stage. He's decided lately that he needs to wear Dad's hat, and if Dad's wearing it he'll go find one of his one. 

A favorite game lately is getting out the pots and utensils and mixing whatever he can find. He especially loves to do it while I'm cooking.

Sprout is learning to stack blocks, but he mostly loves to knock them over.