Greetings from a great day at BYU-Idaho!

Hey all,
I've decided that, since I don't have much time for writing letters, I am going to send a "mass message" via my blog about once a week. There's lots going on here and I'd love to spend time to tell each one of you about it all. I figured this route might allow me to be a little more productive with my time. I started it after graduation, so I apologize for the previous entry.

Life at BYU-Idaho has been fantastic! School isn't hard, there's just a lot of busy work. The people are nice and the spirit here is amazing! My second week, I tried to do baptisms at the temple, but there was a 2 hour wait to get into the chapel. 2 HOURS! It's amazing how much good the people in Rexburg want to do!

Church is good too. It's funny, the first week here the men passing the sacrament had a difficult time remember how to do it. Most of them are either return missionaries or pre-missionaries. Each time has been a different experience, but it's still reverent. And the Bishop is awesome.

I love my roommates. Emily Holbrook from Sedro-Woolley is in the same room as me. In the other room is London Byler and Carissa Lee from Tuscon, Arizona. They are amazing! We are all going through different things and have different perspectives and we're making it work! They all like my cooking (Thanks, Mom!) though London said that she would be fat if I were her mom. I guess I need to stop making desserts. :) Actually, she had to make some commitment for a class and she chose to cut back on sugar. I'm doing it with her and we're motivating each other.

On a healthy note, my favorite way to exercise it Racquet ball! I absolutely love it! We're actually going tonight!

I am going to learn quickly how to save food. I am on the tightest budget I ever have been on and jobs are nearly impossible out here.

Time is short. Book of Mormon starts in 30 minutes. I love you all and miss you! I would love to hear from you. Letters, e-mails, text messages. Calls are hard, with my schedule, but if you do call, I'll get back to you quickly.

Love,

Jessica Wynter Cross

That's right... I'm a big kid now!

You'd think that when you get your diploma, that official piece of paper that states that you have 'learned' what you need to in order to really take on the real word, that you would feel a huge sense of relief and excitement. The ceremony itself was fun, yes, but not a dramatic as I had hoped. I woke the next morning and cleaned the house for friends and family to celebrate my growing up. Then it was back to life as normal, except for the lack of school. And the huge increase in hours spent in a McDonalds uniform repeating "$6.48 at the first window please!" or "Thank you for coming. Enjoy your day." But when I walk into Fred Meyer to buy the groceries of the week (or is it the day), no one looks at me any differently, nor do I get some discount because I survived 4 years at Burlington-Edison High School. Now that I think about it, the only thing that changed was me.

That is what high school needs to be more about. Learning who you really are and how you are going to make those decisions that will shape the rest of your life. That last quarter I had to take an online class through Skagit Valley Community College. Economics 101. I was so frustrated with the fact that I had earned A's and B's in all of my classes in high school, but because of scheduling I was going to have to take this class (that I almost didn't pass) in order to graduate high school! In the rage of the moment(s), I missed the very important lessons that I needed to learn from this: Hard work, and the negative consequences of procrastination. Each class I took, from Beginning Horticulture to AP Physics, there was a lesson I learned that had nothing to do with the class itself. I have found that all areas of our lives are like that, we just need to open our eyes and look for the moral of the experience.

Since that day, much more has changed than my schedule: my location, for example. Marysville (or Tulalip depending on who you're talking to) is a beautiful place. The neighborhood seems friendly and quiet. The biggest difference is not knowing anyone! After living in Skagit County for 15 years, I couldn't go anywhere without running into an old friend, or the parent of a child from the class I volunteered in or someone from church. Here is quite the opposite, though I haven't actually spent much time here due to the commute I make to B-Town and the work we still had on the other house. Still, I am very excited for change and a time to start anew.

Life is going to be great as long as I remember that everyday is the best day of my life... so far.