It's almost here!

Yep, I can hardly believe it, but after 6 months of planning, it's almost time for my first solo adventure. I leave for my study abroad in the UK in just about 3 days. I applied for this program through BYU in December, and have been preparing for it since then. Let's just say, it's felt like it was never going to get here. I'm so excited for this, to see a country that I've always wanted to see, all of the beautiful sites in Ireland, England, and Scotland. Plus I get to study something that I'm fascinated by, the history of the English language as well as all of many varieties. I just graduated from the U of U last month in Elementary Education with an ESL (English as a Second Language) Teaching minor, and since I'm hoping to be able to teach ESL in the future (someday when jobs become available again), I'm hoping that this study of English in its country of origin will better prepare me to teach it. Plus I'm going to get to play heaps! We'll fly into Shannon, Ireland and spend about a week traveling around that country then arrive in London where we'll be living for about a month, seeing the sights there and taking shorter trips around the rest of England, and then in August we'll spend about a week touring Scotland before we fly out of Edinburgh on the 12th. I can hardly wait for my adventure to begin, but at the same time I am getting so scared! This will be my first time away from my family (besides week-long EFY's in Provo and choir tours which took me as far as California), as well as my first time in a foreign country. I am going to be so lost! I'm also going to miss my family and friends sooooo much. I don't know what I'm going to do not seeing or talking to my mom and dad every day or playing with Mikayla and the boys nearly every day. To all of you whose birthdays I'll miss (Jake, Cody, Brett, and Kasey), know that I'll be thinking of you and I hope the awesome/small so they'll fit in my luggage gifts I bring home will make up for it.

Well, this whole blog thing is completely new to me, but hopefully I'll be able to figure it all out so I can keep all of you updated on a fairly regular basis during the next 6 weeks. There will be a computer lab in the flats where we're staying in London so I'll be updating this and putting all my awesome pictures on facebook as well. Thanks for everyone for being excited for me and for letting me go for a few weeks!