Let's Go See the World :: Italy

Final stop on the Epic Adventure: 

Italy

Lessons learned:

- If a night train ticket from Milan to Rome is under 15 EUR,
the seat is most likely less than ideal
- BUY TICKETS ONLINE
- The Colosseum gets crowded quickly - go early
- Gelato fixes *almost* everything- Don't depend on trains to be on time (or even running)
- Couchette's are worth the extra money

Let's Go See the World :: Zurich

I don't know where the summer went but this post is now almost 10 weeks overdue.

Since I did such a terrible job sharing our adventures for the summer, 

I am going to skip the photo sharing for now 

and show you the video I made of our next stop: 

Zurich

Let's Go See the World - Zurich from Ali Fredrick on Vimeo.

Zurich was more of a lazy stop on our European tour.
We did a lot of laundry,
napping,
and relaxing.

And at the end of our stay Bobby twisted his ankle.

You know.
Perfect timing. 

Our European Adventures

Seeing that school has already started

(our last semester, woot!)

It might be time to update you on the adventures we had this summer ;)

To start off, we went on the trip of a lifetime. 

As you read in a previous post, 

Stephen and I spent a significant portion of our time January-June

working with the BYU Ballroom Dance Company on light dresses. 

In May we left with the BDC on a month long European tour. 

First stop: Blackpool, England for the British Open Championships

where the dresses made their debut and both the Ballroom and Latin 

formation teams took home the first place trophy.  

The remaining weeks were followed up by performances all over 

England, Germany, and Switzerland. 

Fortunately, we were able to have fun despite the anticipated dress stress

and here are some pictures to prove it.

Enjoy!

Why We've Been Absent

The last thing you heard from me was a sob story about the stressful semester I had ... 

and then I dropped off the face of the blogging world. 

I know, not good timing. 

To catch you up, 

Stephen and I have been working the past 6 months on 

light dresses for the BYU Ballroom Dance Company. 

You can read about the dresses and the major competition we won at

BYU News 

BYU Dance News 

Salt Lake Tribune 

Mashable 

LDS.org

LDS Philanthropies

Swarovski

BYU Dance Department 

YouTube

and there are more...

but they all take bits and pieces from the articles above. 

To read about the other things we did on tour, check out these Ballroom Dance Team tour news posts: 

Ballroom Dance Company in England

Ballroom Dance Company: England, Germany, Switzerland

Phew. 

It was one roller-coaster 6 months

full of major highs and ultimate lows. 

In the end, 

it was worth it.

Will share pictures and tour stories another time

xo

ALi 

Our Life According to Instagram {Take 2}

We'll start with the good stuff

FOOD

 mini taco bowls, stuffed peppers, triple berry sauce and German pancakes

 cheese blintzes, Mama Honey's recipe

 homemade birthday cheesecake, Stephen's favorite!

pomegranate

something we don't like so much

SCHOOL

early mornings

canceled exams!

Smith charts, textbooks

even on vacation, Grand Canyon Thanksgiving

something we like to call 

CLOTHES

 sequin skirts

 Sperry's

new shoes

and winter wardrobes!

a look at some beautiful

WEATHER

 melting snow

 and sunshine

 and more snow

 and back to sunshine... or sunsets

and more sunsets!

and last but certainly not least, 

FUN

 Winners of the "Spookiest Costume" award

wedding pictures

Bobsled and Skeleton World Cup

 We have some pretty cool relatives

 laundry - surprisingly fun

best of all, date nights :)

We do love school and the bliss of the Provo "bubble",  but we couldn't be more excited to go home for the holidays.  We're hitting up both hometowns, and 3 of the 6 friend weddings we have this break.  Crazy silly wonderfully busy with friends and family.  Maybe not having a phone will help my sanity ;)

*second iPhone to go through the wash cycle* 

Happy Holidays everyone! 

Happy end of the semester!

xo

-the woods

Coexisting

Tonight, Stephen and I were able to attend BYU Ballroom Dance in Concert - Stripes and Stars

This was a lot of fun for multiple reasons: 

a) Dancing

b) ENGINEERING!!

say what?

Engineering? 

At a dance concert?

Yes. 

The Ballroom Dance Company teamed up with an Electrical Engineering Department senior project team to design some of the coolest lightsuits, syncopated to the music.  This teamwork made the homepage of the BYU website! Woot woot!

I'm not doing my senior project until next winter (I'm saving it until the bitter end), but if this one is still in existence AND I decide not to use my research for some reason... then I hope to be on the BYU Ballroom Lightsuits Senior Project. 

The concert was awesome.

Of course it was, BYU Ballroom Dance Company is one the best amateur ballroom dance teams in the world.

  If you have a chance, there are two more performances tomorrow!  Buy your tickets here :)

It's all worth it!

Calloused hands and feet,
blisters,
aching back..
And I love every minute of it!

This semester I decided to have a little bit of fun
so I signed up for 2 dance classes.
Modern and Latin Ballroom.

Last night,
we had a mock competition between the International Ballroom students.
I danced rumba.
Seeing as there are 2 more girls than guys in our class,
the shortest girls (aka ME) had to second partner.
I didn't mind because I paired with one of the better guys in the class.

As the competition went on,
couples were getting cut,
but Josh, Caitlin and I kept making it.
Exciting right!
Except soon there was only one heat,
which means Josh could only dance with one of us,
which means because I was partner #2 -
I had to find a new partner.

Thanks to our wonderful teacher Christina,
she hand picked another good guy from our class who had been cut.
New partner!
We danced semi-finals,
then were called on to the floor to dance in the final round (6 couples left!)

Guess who messed up BIG TIME in that final round?
me.

But apparently the judges didn't notice because my new partner and I won!

I love dance.
Can't wait for more :)

Don't critique this too bad - I'm a beginner

BYU International Ballroom Mock Competition {Samba} from Ali Fredrick on Vimeo.

Fire Alarms and Ice Rinks

This was my weekend.

studying

date night

basketball game

sushi

ice skating

condo trip

hot tubbing

smores

games

Cool Runnings

olympic athletes

t-shirt dying

girls night

It was a good MLK weekend.

And an already much needed break.

Now it's back to the grind :)

How was your holiday?

Who's ready for an all-nighter??

Me.
Remi.
Caedm.
All night.

my secret love affair.

I've been seeing a lot of this lately. 

Some think I'm out with friends, 

others think I'm already in bed. 

But the real fact of the matter is..

I'm with the one I love. 

The caedm lab. 

We have lots of fun together on the 4th floor of the Clyde. 

It's here for me all night if I need it, 

and never closes its doors.

It even lets me bring friends to join in the fun! 

Our relationship has grown much stronger these past few days, 

and now,

 I don't know what I would do without it.  

Caedm, 

thank you for being a loyal friend to me. 

How can I ever repay you?

Stewart Falls

if you haven't hiked it.
you should.
its beautiful.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What's going on outside?

this comic came from a place called PhD comics.  

It's one of my personal fave's
AND
it reminded me of something that happened today.


SO
3:00 rolls around and it's time for my 3 hour signal processing lab.
I sit down at my computer,
log in,
and wait for the rest of the lab section to show up.

people trickle in
then WHAM
the lights go out.
(okay so maybe it didn't make a WHAM noise, but you get the idea)
We're all a bit taken aback.
After a couple minutes of talking,
we decide to go into the hall
with the security lights
and work on homework
until we figure out what's going on.

Then the TA remembers,
"Crap, this happened a couple years ago
when the construction crew hit our main power lines.
The fume hoods in the Chem E labs stopped working
and everyone had to evacuate the building
before the gasses leaked.
Let's go ahead and evacuate now just to be safe..."

We exit the Clyde,
and see it is a beautiful, GLORIOUS day.
We sit out front the building
where lots of other engineering classes,
as well as classes from other buildings (who apparently also lost their power)
congregated, continuing on with their lectures.

The other classes seemed so happy to be outside,
enjoying the beautiful sun.

We stood there squinting.

I don't think we quite knew what to do with warm sunshine,
and a bright sky...

most of us enter the Clyde around 8 am,
and don't exit until around 7 pm...
As cliche, stereotypical, picture perfect as this may sound.
It was so true.
I'm sure we looked crazy.
Just standing there squinting.
We honestly didn't know what to think of non-fluorescent lights.

And just to add to the humor,
today was a HUGE engineering career fair
with LOADS of recruiters interviewing students for jobs and internships.
The Wilk lost power too.
Which means all the recruiters were standing outside as well.

For an hour or so,
it was a giant nerd convention all over campus.
Guys dressed all fancy in their suits and ties
talking about C++, micro-processing, biotechnology...

It was a sight.

Long story kind of shorter,
the power came back on a little over an hour later
and everyone went back into the windowless Clyde
to continue on with their studies.
We weren't able to do lab 3,
so I'm not quite sure how we're going to make up for that.
But I did get a lot of other work done.
Stayed in the CADEM until 8:30!


Man,
I love being an engineer.

To campus, or not to campus...

not to campus. 

Boolean algebra and the Gospel

As we all know, I am a nerd.
I received this text from a friend the other day and thought it was hilarious.

"I'm such a nerd. I was studying my scriptures and thought that life was like Boolean algebra, sometimes if you add more of the gospel you can simplify it more."

Here we go.

So the semester started. 

I'm super excited. 

biked this morning 6:30 am.
class at 9:00, 10:00, 1:00, 2:00, and lab from 3:00-6:00.
run this evening 7:00 pm.
homework.
reading.
shower.
bed.

class starts

tomorrow.
my schedule is laid out.
books are organized.
pencils have new lead and erasers.
TI-89 has new batteries.
agenda is new and crisp.

tough classes coming my way.
I'm excited for the new knowledge.
first semester REALLY living in the Clyde.
the plan is to keep school work at school.
I'll work in my office
in the step down
or the CADEM Lab.

but if I can leave school every night having completed assignments
and not take any work home
*even if that means leaving at midnight every night*
then I might be able to keep my stress level down
and avoid more back pain ;)

Who's ready for the new semester?

one third

done with finals.
I am officially ready to throw in the towel;
Skip ahead to next week.

ReBlog {Holi Festival}

So, I'm re-blogging a video that a friend shared.

But I think it's awesome.

And I was there too :)

Do you...

Completely lost?

I do.

Why do labs make more sense 

when someone else asks the questions?

Mormon Messages { Have I Done Any Good in the World Today? }

The focus of our FHE tonight : )