Home to Me

So i have been so busy working Especially For Youth Sessions that i hardly have had time to sit and think and blog. Tomorrow is the Fourth of July and I was sitting here thinking about how last year on the fourth of July I was traveling to Egypt on a sticky hot Israeli bus and next year I will be WHO KNOWS WHERE on my mission. Israel was an amazing experience, one that I will never forget. I think about it all the time and I would give almost anything to go back there. I LOVED IT. I am also so excited to go on my mission and have tons of new and fun experiences. It seems like I am always doing something or going somewhere. Right now I am working for EFY, which I absolutely adore and I am so thankful for that opportunity, but every single week I am starting over. I am in a new dorm with a new group of counselors and a new group of girls to manage. The few weeks that I am not working I am at my apartment in Provo and that is slightly awkward because I am never there and I do not really know very many people in my ward. I love new places and new adventures but all this packing and unpacking has made me a little tired.
My Bestie Steph is coming to Royal City with me next week. I have been telling her about it and warning her about the size and stuff for weeks. Yesterday at my grandma's I came across a couple of old family pictures that I was showing to her of our house and us growing up in Royal CIty. I MISS IT! I miss walking barefoot everywhere. I miss the simple peace and quiet. I miss the people. I miss the fresh cherries and I miss Pa and Grandma Jean. I miss my siblings and my high school buddies and my cousins my age. I miss our sweet little community we built there in the heart of the Columbia Basin. I even miss going to dirty old Saddle Mountain Supply to get a pop and say hi to my dad. When i was traveling abroad we went to the American Embassy both in Jordan and Tel Aviv. I remember thinking that as much as I loved being cultured and studying abroad that it was like a little peace of Heaven on Earth because it was so familiar and it felt like home to me. That is what Royal City is like.