An Ode to Jenna Bear

This is a Jennie Bean and a Jenna Bear.

She is my roommate and she is awesome. She is currently just being abroad in Scotland and I miss her ever so much. When we first started living together, we discovered so many ridiculous similarities between our lives. I seriously think that we've lived the same life and I don't know how we never met until last year!
Here are just some of our similarities:

1. Her name is Jenna. My name is Jennie.
2. Our full names sound almost exactly alike.
3. Initials: JCL. JLC.
4. When we first met, I put her number in my phone and randomly put her name as Jenna Bear without really thinking about it. I then found out that this as the only nickname she ever had growing up. We then discovered that she put my name as Jennie Bean, which is what my parents have called me my whole life.
   Basically, we inadvertently guessed each other's childhood nicknames.
   And they sound alike.
5. Before we even knew each other, we both named our blogs the exact same thing. Check it.
6. A couple years ago, she worked with a girl named Lacy (names have been change to protect the innocent)who always told her all about her fiance named Andrew. In high school, I dated a boy named Andrew who ended up marrying a girl named Lacy. Yeah, Jenna and I knew opposite halves of this couple.
   AND we were both at their wedding reception and probably saw each other before we ever even met!
7. Both of our mothers are twins.
8. I have grandparents named Farrell and Marilyn. She has grandparents named Gerald and Marilyn.
9. We both lived in somewhat the same area for a couple of years and have memories from a lot of the same places: Iceberg shakes, camping, ice skating, etc.
10. Her grandmother lives just a mile or so down the street from my parents house.
11. Her tone-deaf grandmother used to sing her a weird song about a fat woman hugging and kissing all sorts of men... and once when she was telling us about it, I recognized as a song that my dad taught me when I was little about Chalkin and a-Huggin.
    What kind of weird coincidence is it that we both were taught this super odd song as children?!
    Here's a link to the version that Jenna's grandma sang:

12. We've been told that when I straighten my hair we look somewhat alike... So for Halloween, we dressed up as each other and we looked creepily similar:

13. There are just all sorts of small similarities that we have. It is seriously kind of terrifying. In the best way possible.

Being the sentimental human that I am, I have FINALLY made this blog post. She returns to me this weekend. God bless Scotland.

A quick observation

Being the social scientist I am, I have absolutely loved looking at the ways my roommates' relationships fit into stereotypical categories and the ways they are completely different from the usual. I've also learned to appreciate even more the differences between my roommates. We are all best friends and get along amazingly well, but at the same time, we are each so different. We've always recognized this and commented on it, however it has been magnified since bringing their boys into the picture. They all handle situations differently, and no particular way is better than the others, they are just different. It is absolutely fascinating to me. Yes, I am kind of crazy and I sit and analyze the dynamics between the people in my life. Okay, I won't go into anymore detail about the observations I've made regarding roommates, relationships, and love. But suffice it to say that I really appreciate the way that my major in college taught me to think about the world.

All hallows eve.

Seriously, Halloween is my favorite thing ever. People are SO funny and clever. I love dressing up in costumes and playing an entirely new character. You can be anyone or anything you want, and it gives you a fun way of expressing yourself. Or not. Here is a list of some of the best costumes I saw yesterday around campus:
Judith Butler - know who she is? I didn't either. She's a feminist philosopher. And my co-worker dressed like her and he looked awesome.
A surprising number of Ash Ketchums
Squirtle
Snowman - this costume was so legit. The costume was a solid 7-8 feet tall and made of wool or something on chicken wire. The kid was just waddling around campus and it was so cool.
PSY - a couple of him. Some Asian men thought they were hilarious.
Miranda Sings - some very solid portrayals
All 5 original Power Rangers and they were fighting a guy in a banana suit. SO GOOD.
All sorts of Batmans. I particularly liked the one on his bicycle with his cape flowing.

I personally had three costumes this year. I was planning on having 4, but the penguin didn't actually work out... definitely next year. Last Friday, I was Scary Spice - with none of the other Spice Girls. I didn't get many pictures of this one. But here's the one we got (with Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, and a nerd)

During the day yesterday, I was my roommate Jenna. Terrifying resemblance? I thought so too.

Then last night I was a grandma by the name of Fanny Lever. I was a crotchety old woman; I don't know how to do a jolly grandma. And yes, my hair did smell like baby powder all night.

All in all, this was an incredibly successful Halloween. I love dance parties and friends and candy and costumes and fun. How perfect.

No words.

A picture is worth a thousand words. So please just appreciate what the following say about my roommates.

Yeah, I kind of love them and stuff. No big deal. Oh and they're hilarious. And some of the best people I have ever met. Don't be jealous, though I wouldn't blame you.

Roommates

Sooo I have these people in my life called roommates. Mine are kind of the greatest in the entire world. I have always been blessed with AMAZING roomies. Always.
This is the original six of us:

The freshman roommates. Kaylee, Alyse, Andee, Mandy, and Kendra. We were together through so much and were best friends. I could take an entire blog post, scratch that, any number of blog posts to recount our adventures together that year. It's not often you get 6 girls randomly thrown together that just bond and get along as well as we did. We were CRAZY back then (not that we aren't still crazy). We were together through half of sophomore year too. Then Kaylee went to London, and Michelle moved in. That was lovely. Here we are:

Then this past year, Kaylee returned to us. Mandy decided marriage was probably a good idea. And Alyse went off for some new, wonderful experiences... but let's get real, she's still practically a roommate! But that semester I was blessed with the experience of having new roommates, something that I hadn't really gone through in my two years of college experience. There were four of the originals and I was again blessed with great new roommates. Krystal and Amber thought we were insane at first. Let's be serious, they were terrified. But they learned to love us. I adore those girls with all my heart. Here we are:

The next semester, we had a plethora of sister missionaries. Kendra and Krystal both left us to go serve the Lord in Phoenix and Tokyo. I love them. And so we got two new roommates. Kate and Kellie. I love them both. Let me tell you, Kate is the most outrageous, wonderful, silly girl I know and I cherish that semester I got to spend sharing a room with her! She's engaged now, which is thrilling. Sadly, I don't think we ever got a picture of all of us together. But here's Kate, she's great. Though this picture is not so much:

And now it comes to the current arrangement of roommates. There's me, Kaylee, and Andee. We've been roommates for three, going on four years and it's been complete madness nonstop! And we've added three of the most adorable females I've ever encountered. Jenna, Halie, and Cebre. This is 5 of the 6 (Cebre was with her fiance, a noble excuse if I do say so myself.):

I love these girls more than you can know. We've only all lived together for a couple months, but we've bonded deep and it's been fantastic. Halie is currently rocking the piano in Italy, and I miss her immensely, but she'll be back in a couple weeks. And this is us all on our last day all together as roommates. Now Cebre is all married and the like and Terra is moving in any moment! I'm thrilled!

So there you have it, folks. All of the roommates I've ever been blessed with, and it seriously has been a blessing. I've never had a roommate I didn't absolutely adore. I have learned so much from them and they've helped me to grow. And I am still best friends with all of them. They accept my crazy and they bring some crazy of their own. This is why I love them. Every single one of them.

All-nighter? Why not!

Freshman year Kaylee and I decided to have an epic all-nighter. Here is a list of things we did that night:

Homework was the main reason we stayed up, and it was obviously the one thing we didn't get done. And here is the picture of the end of the night. Note: the clock says 6:15. Nice.

So this year we decided to keep with tradition and have our annual all-nighter. Annual in this instance meaning we did it 2 years ago, completely forgot about it last year, and then doing it again this year. So when I got home from SYTYCD the night of my birthday, the decision was made that that was the night for all-nighting.

We began our evening with a lovely 2am trip to Walmart to get supplies. While there, we ran into a BEAUTIFUL friend of ours. Love me some Captain America.

And then we stood in the check out line for an excessively long amount of time.

We then made some cookies.

And did some homework while we watched Swan Princess.

I know what you're thinking, "How in the world could you do homework during your all-nighter? You didn't do homework last time." And my answer to this inquiry is that we are much more mature nowadays, so naturally we were responsible and studious while depriving our selves of sleep.

We then delivered cookies at 4 in the morning.

You may not be able to tell what this is.. ok, let's get real, obviously no one except Kaylee and I know what is going on in this picture. Just know that I was falling out of the car and it was freezing and late and hilarious.

We stayed up all night. Not one wink of sleep. And the next morning, we both went to work at 8 and then a full day of classes. It was worth every ounce of being tired.

It was a lovely night. And I love Kaylee. We have fun and bond. Shweeeet.