Life? Life is Good!

Things have been so busy recently.... I have been enjoying times with my new roommates and living so close to my school was a brilliant idea! School pictures came, I have to say, mine are much better than last year (and I have enough pictures of myself to last a thousand graduations, hahaha)!

Living so close to school I have found a lot of time to go visit the Temple and last week when I went to visit the Temple I had a great experience and was reminded of the purpose of this life! I woke uup early on Saturday morning and headed to the Draper Temple. When I got there there was a group of people, about my age ready to enter for baptisms. I had the thought of, "I should hurry and get there before them so I don't need to wait for them" but I decided to just enter the Temple after them (there was no reason for me to rush) I was so glad I waited. I watched as they checked in and realized that for one of the girls it was her first time. Everyone who had come with her had already been through the Temple and worked to find family names specifically so they could join her on her first trip to the Temple. As they turned the corner there was a rush of excitement and the girl who was the center of the trip turned to one of the Temple workers and said, "Those are my parents". She had surprised her parents by coming to the Temple during their shift but that wasn't the best part. It turns out that the people with her were her siblings. It was such a cool reminder of the power the Temples have and the importance of family in our lives. It was so sweet to see this family band together and see their happiness of all being in the Temple together for the first time!

As Stephanie likes to say... Life? Life is good! Although it will be better in a couple of weeks when I get to listen to the Prophet's voice during General Conference!

Dad's are the best!

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful dad (and all the dad's out there). I hope that you feel appreciated and know how much you are loved! Continue to be so amazing, I am glad for the example in my life.

Happy Mother's Day

Today was great! I was able to go to my mom's ward and sing with her and other family. After that we stopped by Grandma Fiso's grave and left some flowers. We then went up to Morgan to spend some time with Grandma Dickson and my mom's family. It was great. I love my mom and I am so thankful for the example she is to me...

Happenings

So life after practicum has been crazy! Here is what has happened...

1) I got an internship!!!! Starting in July (year-round school) I will be teaching 3rd grade at Jordan Ridge Elementary, if you want to know more about the school you can look here! I am so excited and I can't wait to get started and meet my 3rd graders!!! I will be on A track and I have a friend also on A track so we are planning exotic vacations to China and Africa... Well maybe in the future, but very possibly California.

2) My grandmother died. On Friday April 5th I was out shopping with a friend when I started feeling uneasy,  we ended up heading home soon after and I felt like calling my parents, they had just gotten home and went to grandma's room to find that she was not breathing. She died soon after. This was tough for me because I have never had anyone close to me die before and I have never really gone to a funeral of someone I knew before. But I know that she is in a better place now (More to come on my amazing grandmother later). The night before the funeral we had a family meeting  (Samoan tradition) where all the extended family (my grandpa's mother's brother's children included) came and were able to share rememberances of my grandmother, it was lovely. On Saturday we had the funeral and we actually watched them lower the coffin and the concrete into the ground before leaving the cemetery (Samoan tradition). This morning I got an email including a video of my grandma that I want to share, it was taken soon before she passed away. 

Pat Fiso from Fesler Films on Vimeo.

3) I had my last day of classes as an undergrad today!!!!!! I still have finals but I am so close to done and I cannot wait to actually graduate. In the meantime I will be satisfied with having my own classroom for a year!  But seriously, being done with classes is great but I will miss the amazing girls that I have met and befriended on the way to graduation! I hope we can all stay in touch...

4) General Conference happened and was great! Although I enjoyed conference I was not as focused as I could have been so I will go back and reread the talks but I loved the ideas presented. I especially liked Sister Wixom's talk about children and the way we speak to them.

Okay so maybe it is only four things... I feel like there has been much more that has happened but at the moment my brain is not cooperating so those four it shall be.

Sunday thoughts

I have so many family and friends at the moment who are on missions or leaving soon on a mission so I get a lot of missionary emails. I love reading these emails and seeing how much these family and friends have grown and applying their knowledge to my life. One of my friends recently challenged those back home to share a message every week that will strengthen or comfort someone else. I am going to try just that...


While looking at the Mormon Channel on Youtube I found this video. The video focuses on courage and perseverance. It refers to the story of Ester and the faith and courage that she needed, to accomplish the things asked of her. The story of Ester is one of my favorites. I'd like to think that I could be as faithful as her if the situation ever arose, so likening Ester to modern women of the church really made an impression on me. I know that we can do hard things. Like Ester and many others we are not alone, we have the support system of our family, friends, ward members, Father in Heaven and Jesus Christ. As long as we are striving to be our best we will have the strength and courage to go on. I hope you enjoy this...

Moments That Matter Most

I'll be short and sweet today but I just want to say how thankful I am for the time we have on this Earth and the knowledge that I have of life after this Earth. I hope that we may all work to make the best of our situations and learn to devote our time to others! Here are a couple of videos that I have loved this week and I hope you enjoy them too...

Summer Nights and volleyball

This Summer has been amazing!!! Now that I am out of classes I have been having lots of fun... Here is what  I have been up to this Summer:

Picnic/Swing racing at the park
   see here
Donuts on National Donut day
        BreAnna and I walked around Provo to find Donuts to celebrate.

Cold stone (made possible by the bishop)
        Samantha and I were watching a movie one night when Samantha says "there's the bishop" soon enough he was knocking on our door. I answered it and asked him what was up... He replied saying "oh we were in the neighborhood for visits and we found this on your property (Produces a twenty dollar bill). We thought that you and your roommates should take it and go get milkshakes or something of the sort." He gave me the money and left the house. Samantha and I looked at each other for a minute and then went to relay the story for BreAnna before going to get cold stone! *You don't question the bishop ;)

Reading and lots of it
      I decided that I would join the Provo Library Summer reading program and have been reading ever since!
Seven Peaks
      Having the pass of all passes has been great for me this Summer I have been swimming so many times I love it!!!
Snow Cones
       Linnea is back in the States and we met for Shaved Ice and caught up.

Game Nights and Volleyball
      I love being able to spend time with people! Especially when I get to spend time doing the things I love!
Lu'au's
      Justin got married and Marie graduated I got to dance at both. I can't wait to dance at Robbie's wedding  reception in a couple of months!

There have also been receptions (Brianna and Sarah are married Lauren is engaged), lunches (Including a free meal at Tucano's), and time spent with friends that have been quite enjoyable...



Ohhh and I got Honors for my Latin medals exam!!! Woot Woot! (Here's the Samba and the Rumba)

Did you know...

... that I am part Polynesian?? Truly I am! I know you would never guess it but I am a part Samoan and I believe (maybe too much) that I can dance like a Polynesian. That is why I have performed in BYU's Lu'au pretty consistently while I've been here at school.

For those of you that don't know about the BYU Lu'au here is a background... Every year BYU's Multicultural Student Service's office puts on a Lu'au. The Lu'au is based on volunteers (the choreographers, dancers, ushers, etc.) during the years that I have been at BYU I have volunteered as a dancer in the Lu'au and it is quite the time commitment. The Lu'au takes place at the end of March and practice starts at the beginning of January. The Lu'au has different sections that you can sign up for (Tahiti, Samoa, New Zealand, Tonga, Fiji, and Hawaii).

I have performed in Lu'au before but, this year I decided to do Tahiti and New Zealand sections. It was quite a time commitment starting in January I had practice from 6-8 (in the morning) every Friday for Tahiti, and practice from 10-12 every saturday for New Zealand. Despite the fact that it was a huge time commitment I really enjoyed participating in Lu'au this year. This was the first time that I have done New Zealand and it was exciting to learn the Poi Balls and to be able to learn some songs and have a chance to sing while performing.

I love performing and Lu'au is the only performing I have done at BYU so I always look forward to it!

New Zealand:

Did I mention I was the front row for the single poi dance?

Tahiti:

Thanks to my lovely cousin Jesi for these pictures!

Backstage:

Here is the Tahiti group that I performed with I'm sure we were all glad to get our Friday mornings back!

With Karmila and DeTiare!

And where would we be without a jumping picture!?

We Fiso's need to stick together! I convinced Steph to do Lu'au freshman year and then she was stuck! ;)

Melissa was helping backstage

Sadly DeTiare graduates this year! :( but it was fun to dance with her while we could!

Lexi joined in the fun this year too!

Last picture I promise but this one was inspired, though maybe not as much as we thought, by the other so we needed a comparison somewhere!