[[FFA owns my soul now]] {{not really, l0l}}

Wow, it has been a long time since I’ve posted! Well, let’s start off with guys.
DJ was my boyfriend when Paige died. He ended up being a liar and a jerk so yeah, he’s gone.
I was too busy the rest of the summer to find a guy, l0l, until recently. Grant David Harness is the absolute sweetest, nicest guy EVER. He runs all over the place for me, or would if I’d let him. He’s also very very VERY good-looking…he’s got the most gorgeous eyes… I never completely understood what writers meant when they say “…looked into his liquid brown eyes…” but now I know!! Grant’s eyes are amazing, and they have the thickest lashes! Plus he has a job, a truck (yuck, Chevy! l0l), and an amazing family. Oh yeah, and he never cusses, and lives legally. Sadly, he’s just not my type. We dated, but now we are just really good friends. My idea. I felt like a jerk because he “still really likes me” but going to college and everything won’t make it any easier to like someone who I am just really comfortable being friends with, and nothing more.
Now, for the rest of the summer…I have been gone over a month for FFA. I spent the first week of my summer in Hot Springs at Camp Couchdale, running for an FFA state office. It was very very difficult. I had to be up-to-date on my ag issues (completely pulled that round out of my butt! L0l), I had to write a 4 minute extemp speech on a ridiculous topic, write and memorize a 6 minute speech on a good topic in 14 hours, take a very difficult test and endure 2 hard interviews. Really, the anticipation of everything made it worse than it really was.
I then went back for BLAST-Off (Building something And something Teams of Officers) training where I proceeded to do an okay job of speechmaking and goal-setting. That sucked 4 days out of my summer.
Then we all took a 6 hour van trip to Paris Landing TN for NLCSO (National Leadership Conference for State Officers) with the states of….TN, KY, MI, and AR. Yeah. Have NO IDEA why MI was there…l0l J. Made some awesome!!! friends at NLCSO. The theme was “Discover the Rhythm” and Zack Kinne (the National FFA President) and Tyler Tenbarge (one of the National Vice-Presidents) did a super good job of conducting the workshops! Oh, yeah, and I learned a new line-dance, and got a bunch of awesome free stuff.
THEN we had 2 weeks off, but I had to miss the Fourth of July for ALC (Arkansas Leadership Conference) training and ALC. That was the HARDEST thing for me to do, FFA-wise, because we had 3 days to absorb SO MUCH TRAINING AND INFORMATION!!! But 2 weeks we did the conference ended up turning out really great even though the first week we never got to bed before 2, and the second week we never got to bed before 12. It’s not because we didn’t want to, but we had to stay up to do room checks, and prepare for the next day, and have meetings. But Mr. Romeo from Conway gave us the best compliment. “I think this week as been so much more like ALCs from the eighties and nineties…ya’ll did such a great job, this is the best ALC I can remember in the past 15 years. I had fun as an ag teacher and that’s hard to do. Thank you!” No, Mr. Romeo, THANK YOU! Just that one compliment right there made these past two week s of stress and tears and frustration and hard work completely worth it.
So now, let’s talk about college…I leave on either the 23rd or the 25th I’m not sure yet, l0l. But it’s a 5 hour drive that I’m completely comfortable making, so I’m good…I’ll be in room 206 of Talley Hall (that’s the agri dorm). I had to switch roommates. I really can’t think of anything else. Oh yeah, my schedule is super easy.
So, I will put a post with more detail, one post for NLCSO, with pictures, one for ALC, with pictures, and one for state convention, also with pictures.
Sooooo…byeee!
Much love!
Katie