Join the Ally Rally

Ally's making her political debut this week and I have no doubt her presidential campaign will be wildly successful.(It's in our blood.) A little taste of her strategy:

You don't need it Al, but good luck anyway!

Hello Disneyland.

Thanks to Nevada day and no Friday classes I got to take a little trip with the fam. The pretzels at Disneyland have never been so delicious. I miss it (and them) already.

You look like the 4th of July, it makes me want a hot dog real bad.

The 4th of July is probably my favorite holiday. (I say probably because I also really love Christmas, and my birthday.)

This year Dad, Emily, and Ally came up to visit and celebrate with me! (Mom, Hailey, and their sensitive ears stayed home. They're coming to see me tomorrow.)

On Friday they came and picked me up from work and then with Shannon in tow, we ate at Happy Sumo. If you live in Provo or SLC and you haven't joined their VIP list, you should. Now.

Saturday we ate breakfast in great company and then went to visit SLC's "This Is The Place," monument. Later that night we celebrated Independence Day with David Archuletta and Brad Paisley at the Stadium of Fire. (There are no pictures of that.)

Emily at the Monument.

Emily being the Paparazzi. If she's not careful I'm going to freak out like Britney Spears did.

Em and I

Em, Ally and I

Dad and some girls

Al and I

Sunday, after we tortured Ally by making her sit through a singles ward testimony meeting, we watched 17 Miracles. Usually I'm not down with LDS films, but this one wasn't bad. It was about the Martin and Willie handcart companies, and it wasn't cheesy.

There's this one scene that I've been thinking about all week. After they cut their rations for the last time and it started to snow, one of the women decided she couldn't walk anymore, so she kissed her husband and children goodbye and she sat down on a rock and cried.

Maybe I am completely heartless and unsympathetic, but I was so disappointed in her. I wanted to yell at her to stand up and follow her family. I've obviously never walked more than a few miles, so I'm obviously not qualified to comment. I just know, that I never want to be that woman. When things get hard, I never want to the one to sit down on a rock, give up, and wait to die.

On a much much lighter note, we watched the parade on Monday! We also watched two old men fight at the parade, and then it was time to say goodbye.

I had such a fun weekend, Provo is always 1000000 times better when family's in town.

When in doubt, always blame the dog.

Dad likes to joke that there's estrogen literally dripping from the walls of our house. If I were to ever see little drops of estrogen sliding down the wallpaper, I doubt I'd be very surprised. With 5 women(6 including or dog), girly behaviors are to be expected.

I was/am the test run. Mom and Dad knew to take the Barbie shoes off of the little girls' dolls, because I ate quite a few. Mom and Dad knew not to walk Emily into 6th grade, because they had mortified me 2 years earlier. Mom and dad knew never to let the little girls wear black eyeliner, because everyday for 2 years I left the house looking like I had rubbed coal all over my eyes.

I'm kind of rambling, but the point of this post is to tell you that I love being the oldest. I love that I came first, and I love that I got to be the test run. Mostly because of this story:

When I turned 16, all of a sudden I was allowed to invite boys over to "hang out." This had never happened in the Stolworthy house, and every time it did, believe me it was an event. Emily, Hailey, and Ally would parade in and out of the room telling embarrassing stories about me, blending things for no reason(other than to be annoying), and doing gymnastic tricks right in front of the t.v.

Usually I'd let them be crazy for 2.6 seconds and then yell, "Mooooooooooooooooom get them out of here."

Mature, I know. Mom doesn't reply to what she calls the "polish intercom system," so I usually had to go upstairs and hiss about how embarrassing my sisters were and beg my parents to put their children to bed. Mom and Dad would kind of roll their eyes(because I was ridiculously dramatic) and corral the little kids up stairs. One of the little girls managed to get out and sneak downstairs every time. I'm about 99% sure Dad was paying them to spy, but that's a debate for another time.

On this particular occasion Kayla Williams(Starbuck now) and I had a couple boys over to watch a movie. The little girls had finally left us alone, and we were trying to put the moves on these super hot guys.

Halfway through the movie we hear someone fart.

I blame Kayla, Kayla blames the dog, and we all just go back to watching the movie. It happens one more time, only we pass it off as a couch cushion noise.

Then it happens again, only this time louder and we just can't continue to ignore the trend. I blame Kayla again, she blames the dog again, and then we start to hear snickering.

We turn the lights on, and out rolls one of my sisters(I can't tell you which one) from underneath the coffee table. She had spying for an hour, and the only reason we found her is because she couldn't keep her farts to herself! My sister screams, "It was me, I farted! I farted 7 times!" and it was made abundantly clear, neither Kayla, nor the dog, was to blame.

This kind of precious blackmail, only comes about when you're the oldest, and it's stories like this one, I can't wait to tell future brother-in-laws. Payback little girls, pay back.