Getting the Good

     Okay people, I am so very sorry it has been a while since I have put a new post up. Life has hit me square in the face. I am currently taking an online course that has required me to stay shackled to a desk. When I wasn't working on that I have been helping my parents with the odds and ends things like spraying weeds or pruning rose bushes. But here I am now.
       And to my pleasant surprise I have over 994 pageviews! Thank you so much to all of my readers, even if it is just my mom checking the blog three times a day. Just kidding, y'all are great.
      Well to start off today's epic post, I want to wish you guys a Happy National Dairy Month. Being someone who is very involved in the dairy industry and loves everything about it, I love to tell anyone who will listen about it. Milk production is one of Idaho's top commodities and the state ranks number 3 in milk production in pounds. That is a big deal.
      Although the month is in celebration of the industry and its prosperity, but also in celebration of those farmers who have been able to survive the hard times and have kept the industry alive. My grandpa, a member of the United Dairymen of Idaho, has always been a dairy farmer. I can tell you first hand, I have seen his heartbreak as milk prices have plummeted and there is no money to make payments and the bank is threatening to shut down the operation and sell it all bit by bit. I have watches as he sat in meeting after meeting with different investors and banks to try and receive the loans and financing that he needs to continue on for just a while longer. The not knowing of whethere the family dairy would stay in the family for one more day was excruciating to all those involved, but especially for my grandfather, who has put his heart, mind, and soul.
      Now, it isn't just my grandfather who has had to think about how much feed is left or what milk price futures look like. It is all of the dairy farmers in Idaho and all over the country. So on behalf of myself, Thank you to all those dairy farmers. I know I wouldn't be able to live without my milk or icecream. Thank you to all those who work so hard, so that I can Get the Good.
      So for all those who may not know me, I am quite the cheesy person (haha see what I did there). I love lame jokes, especially the ones with a nerdy undertone. So in celebration of National Dairy Month, I hope I can provide you with a little laughter with my top dairy jokes!
      Enjoy!

Why I do quite agree with you Ron Swanson.

This one is totally my favorite

Story. Of. My. Life.

      And what would be National Dairy Month without a few pictures of my favorite bovine friends.

During the summer, my uncle allows his Organic herd to go to his little ranch a few miles from the dairy farm. Everyday they happily walk to their access to green grass. And when it is time for milking time we saddle up the ponies and take the cow dogs to get the reluctant cows back in time for milking. My cousin Thomas, on his pony Marchessa, usually goes down and gets them by himself. But that day my boyfriend, Keith (on Jordan), and myself (on my white pony Baby Spam) helped him out. 

Selfies with bottle babies never disappoint.

So I preg check and run the dairy records as a job. I go to my aunt and uncle's dairy and help them out once a month. On this day we had a lot of cows to get done and instead of my aunt helping me pull 2 cc's of injection out, she kept snapping pictures. 

Quinn and I preg checking

So these two babies are twins from my aunt's prize show cow. This particular cow is also the daughter of my aunt's first and most award wining show cow. These genetics have been on their diary for generations and are continuing on. Usually I have my little helper and favorite cousin, Andrew (5) to help me feed babies. But on this particular night he decided to climb on top of hutches to "make sure you have enough light." 

Obviously we want the milk in the big tank, but this is what we call the "Can". It is where we put the Colostrum (new momma milk that has to be fed to their baby) or sick cow milk that is fed to the calves. Because milk checks are based on quality and we don't want our consumers to drink milk not right for humans, this is a good way to not only make sure the calves are fed the milk they need and ensure the quality of our milk. 

The last time I worked, these hoodlums were causing havoc. Having five babies born in two days caused quite the backup in the calf hutch situation. And to make matters worse, they are big enough to recognize a bottle and that they want it and they will mow over and maul any person or thing that walks into the calf barn. The only way to make sure that I didn't end up with bruises was to feed one calf with one hand, use the other as a pacifier for another calf, and attempt to body block the third. Again, Jennifer (aunt) was so helpful. She refused to go into the barn for fear of being attacked. So she took pictures herself. 

      So people, I hope that you make the most of the rest of this great month and remember that there is someone out there who has to make the good, so you can get the good. No matter how picky you are about your dairy products (like I am) or if you are just a lover off all things milk products, that is something everyone can appreciate.

Happy National Dairy Month!
Peace, Love, and FFA!

McKenzie
"Cheese-Whiz"
"Dairy-Queen"
"Cheese-Snob"
"Ice Cream- Fanatic"
"Lover of cows with black and white spots"
"Dairy girl, through and through"

When I Went to the Deep South

     Today I am writing to y’all while being my mother’s shotgun rider following a long train of school buses through Rattle Snake Pass going to Moscow from Wallowa Lake, Oregon. By doing so I am hoping that I will be able to type this out without getting car sick. Hopefully my “methodical” picking and eating of only one color at a time of M&Ms will help keep my nauseous tendencies to a minimum.

     On that note, we are going to do a little Toss-back Tuesday.

      A year ago today, I was visiting the great state of Mississippi as they kicked off their State Conference. That is definitely an experience that I will never forget.

     How did I get to go to Mississippi you may be asking. Well one, FFA takes you places, duh! And two, I met the two coolest people ever at the Utah State Leadership Conference.  Hayden and Drew are seriously the two coolest and most genuine people that you will meet. And from the moment we shook hands and introduced ourselves that first day at convention and jammed in my car as I drove them around Logan, I knew that we were going to be close. And with that came an invitation to go to their state and see how the South does things.  

     Funny enough, I wasn’t the only North-Westerner going. And it wasn’t until I had landed and been in the state for a few hours that they told me that Washington’s Micheal Heitstuman was also attending the convention. I couldn’t have asked for a better person to have to hang out and do pre-session with than him.

• All in all I learned a handful of things:
• Alligator is actually pretty good. I would totally eat it again.
• You haven’t ate fried chicken till you eat it in the deep South.
•  There is such things as getting sick of fried chicken.  Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE fried chicken and eat it all the time and a lot of it, but I swear that is the only thing they like to eat. I am not kidding you when I say that for one day’s meals it was chicken and a biscuit for breakfast, fried chicken sandwich for lunch, and fried chicken and mashed potatoes and gravy for dinner.
•    Mississippi has a Junior Association. This is for middle school members and they are able to participate during those years in Junior Association CDE’s and they even have their own Junior State Officers and a day of just their sessions during the week. It was different for me to see such young of people wearing the FFA jacket, but cool for me to see how passionate these young people are and continue to be as they go through “Senior” FFA.
•   Not all people who live in Dixie has a thick southern accent. The more Northern chapters has mild accents, whereas the more South you get the thicker and more slurred the speech gets. I also heard my accent get thicker and thicker every day I was there. Although I have lived in Idaho my entire life, I apparently have a slight southern drawl. Even all the FFA members in Mississippi asked me if I was sure I wasn’t from Texas or something.

     But my one of my all-time favorite stories from the South is from their dance. Now if you don’t know either me or my mother, you cannot possibly imagine our love for dancing. Furthermore, you cannot fathom our ability to “drop it low.” Needless to say we are the whitest black girls you will ever meet. And there is not a song that I love more to drop it to than the “Wobble”.  When that song came over the loud speakers, I put my hands in the air and started to drop it like its hot. After completing that song and continuing on into the next one, I had a girl come up to me, grab both my arms in her hands, stare me square in the face, and say, “Honey, I heard you were a hooker. Is that true?” People, I ASSURE you that I am NOT a hooker. For the rest of the trip that became the joke.         Needless to say, I think I left my mark on Mississippi.

     While I was there, I was able to meet with one of the main officials of the Veterinary Program. He was able to take me on a private tour of the facilities and sit down with me and talk with me about my future. I can honestly say that if I hadn’t have met him and gone on that tour, I wouldn’t have known what opportunities that Mississippi State University could hold for me. I can most definitely say that going back to Mississippi for Doctorate of Veterinary Medicine school wouldn’t have even been an option that I would have known to consider.

     Honestly I cannot wait to go back.

     And a quick trip down memory lane... 

Hayden and me after Utah State Convention. 

My alligator Po-Boy (what this sandwich is referred to). Delicious. 

This was a reflections that they did before session one time. It was way cool that they painted the black in the top picture and then on the flip side was the Ignite.

Pre-session fun. 

More pre-session fun. Interestingly enough, the girls were the best at shaving. Who knew?!

While sitting behind the backstage curtain watching a session, Mr. Micheal leaned over and placed his head on my shoulder and was looking at his phone. Soon enough he was sound asleep. It was honestly a great thing that he was there with me. It totally made my trip great. 

     It is an experience like this that I can only attribute to my involvement in FFA. That is what I love about FFA. As a State Officer, we always tell our members that being involved can take them places like Washington D.C. and Indianapolis, but at the time I was telling them that, I didn’t imagine that FFA would take me to Starkville, Mississippi.

     I am super excited to be back in Moscow and see all of my peeps’ shining faces. It has been a great and very rainy trip thus far, and I can’t wait for the rest of the week. It is slightly weird because I am a chaperone and not a student and I am now old enough that I don’t know all of these kids anymore, but I am, nonetheless, loving every minute of it.  Like I said in my post last week, I do love to take selfies and want to meet more of my readers in person. Come on up and say hello and ask for a picture and I will be so tickled!

     After several stops, the bus driver skillfully missing a rouge deer in the road, and my pausing to let my car sickness subside, we are finally in Moscow! Let the fun continue on and on!

Peace, Love, and FFA!

McKenzie 

Vallivue FFA Chapter 

Jimmy's Lesson - A Steady Hand and A Patient Mind

     Okay people. Blog post time. And it is late. Again. Apologies. Okay, I'm over it. 

     Like everyone else, I am SO looking forward to Moscow and I cannot wait to see all of my readers and not to mention all my other FFA peeps. Don’t be afraid to come up to me and ask me questions or say hi. We might even take a selfie or two that could possibly go up on the blog! Super exciting.

     Anywhoo…

     A couple of days ago, while home for just a few days between trips, my dad and I decided to pull the horses out and go for a ride. Mind you, since I have been gone and he has been travelling with his new job, my ponies haven’t been out of the barn much. And to top it off, one of my boys is a Thoroughbred/ Quarter Horse mix.  With his blood always boiling and high strung attitude of a barrel horse, he has continued to get more and more barn sour. Being a horse that requires a lot of constant riding and a rider who is experienced enough to keep him entertained, the combination of not being rode and being rode by people who don’t know how to control him, his attitude took a turn for the worst. With his head high and nostrils flared, we began to trot around our usual loop. Soon enough he began to crow hop, toss his head, stomp his back feet, and paw ferociously at the ground with his front feet. Equipped with a thin leather strap, I brought my arm back, connecting the strap to Jimmy’s rump, trying to correct his behavior. He swerved, hopped, and snorted. Bringing my arm behind my hip, he began to turn tight circles in one direction and then I would direct him to do circles in the other direction. Soon he would give up his fight and stand. And we could continue on. But it we wouldn’t have traveled much farther than a few lengths when he would break out into another juvenile fit and we would repeat the process over and over. It took almost 45 min of this repeating process for Jimmy to figure out that I was his rider and he would behave how I expected him to behave. After that, we rode peacefully and romantically watched the sunset together.

     Awe, how cute.

     Now I didn’t just want to tell you some useless story from my life that cannot possibly connect to all of y’all.

     Pretty soon, upperclassman and older chapter officers, are going to be encountering a new crop of Freshman FFA Members. Now I am not saying that these newcomers are wild, flared nostriled, barn sour horses. But how we handle situations are similar. No we aren’t going to be using a leather strap or making them do tight circles to help them either learn to love FFA as much as you or learn how to act while in the blue jacket. 

     On many occasions, you will come across new members that want to just soak it all up and love it instantly. You will also see those that have friends who tell them that it “isn’t cool to wear that corduroy jacket”. You will also pass along kids who have a personality that loves to pester, break the rules, or just have a bad attitude against everything. Each person is their own person and will do as they like. But as an older chapter member, you have to set an example and help them learn the ropes.

By you not complaining about Official Dress, they learn that it 1) isn’t that bad to wear it 2) wearing it right is better than not 3) that it is not okay to bash on wearing it. It is as simple as that. These kids are looking up to you. You don’t have to sit and lecture and “freak out” on them when they do something wrong. Help them, show them.  I know that there are those members who will give your grief and you feel like they do things just to make you mad and that they don’t like you. I have felt this way often when I was in high school. It wasn’t until I had gone back to my home chapter to do a workshop that those kids who I thought hated me and did things out of spite, actually looked up to me and what I had done for the chapter. They missed how I was obsessive about their “tally-wackers” and straight ties and how I was always brisk and direct and gave succinct marching orders. 

For most who are reading this, this who shpiel will make absolutely no sense. It isn’t until you have experienced being an officer, older member, or just someone that people look up to, that this advice will come in handy.

     Now back to my Jimmy Dean. Today we rode again. He was calm and willing to do as I asked. He was the horse that I know and love and the night was pleasant as we bounced (aka Jimmy’s trot) down the road next to my dad riding my Missouri Fox Trotter (who is gaited and my dad’s butt never left the saddle while I looked like a Jack Rabbit bounding over sage brush). Because of my steady hand the other day and my patience to teach him patience and all the stuff he thought he had forgotten, there was a world of difference today. If you are willing to take the time and have patience, you will create a great “crop” of Freshman who will become a great new generation of FFA members.

See you in Moscow!

Peace, Love, and FFA!

McKenzie

P.S. I was serious about the selfies. I love selfies. And I would love to post them on my blog. If you see me, come on up and introduce yourself (if I don’t know you that is) and ask for a selfie. And if you don’t know what I look like, I will probably be the one taking selfies of my own face. 

Pack It On Up

     If there is one thing that I truly pride myself on is my ability to pack a week and a half's worth of clothing in a very small bag. Now I know that when it comes to Twin Falls, packing is pretty easy because y'all spend a lot of time in official dress, but when it comes to Moscow, there is a lot of down time that is going on. With down time comes regular clothes, and with regular clothes comes more stuff to pack. So today I am going to lay some knowledge on ya and show all of you how I make it happen.
      So there are a few essentials that I insist on being on my packing list every time I go anywhere:

• one new pair of jeans
• tops for each day
• underwear
• socks
• sweats (aka pajamas)
• tank tops/ undershirts 
• sweatshirt
• jacket
• Official Dress....... DUH!
• outfit for the dance

     Of course there are some other important things, but these are my main needs. Now notice that I am only packing one pair of jeans. See, I believe that jeans are the best on the second day or so this new pair is for the dance or to bust out as needed.

      But as you can see, the basics alone is a hefty amount of clothing. Not to mention we haven't added O.D. and bathroom toiletries. So the trick is to roll all of the items up into little rolls. Now ladies, if you have a certain undershirt/tanktop that goes with a certain shirt, go ahead and roll those together, just makes it all easier.

     As you can see above, all the essentials are neatly rolled and can be placed gently into the bottom of the bag that you wish to take. I always use a small duffle back. And once I place those in a nice layer on the bottom of the bag, I usually create a layer of shoes. A lot of times I wear boots, so I will pack my tennis shoes, my official shoes, and my Sperry's (I honestly cannot live without those things). The shoes can also be switched with the clothing layer, as long as it is relatively flat. Since I carefully arrange the shoes so it is nice and even, I am able to place my toiletry bag and make up back right on top. And with enough luck, I will have enough room to place my official dress over the top of those two bags and very gently tucked into the sides of the bag. This not only makes it easy to unpack what you need to along the way or for bag checks. 

     Up next, my toiletry bag. Being away for a week means that there a lot of things that we need. 

     Now I will say, that this bag is nowhere near the capacity that I have had it at. This bag is one that I acquired at Ulta and I love it. I have my travel shampoo and conditioner, bath soap, shaving supplies, deodorant, toothbrush and paste, and other misc stuff that I have decided to put in it. I also like to put any of my jewelry in here. Both sides zip so I know that nothing will get lost. This bag then folds up and zips altogether. I will also place one of my make up pallets with all of my different eye shadows in there. I fits right nicely inside and then I don't have to worry about any of the shadows cracked or it getting lost in my unpacking. 

       Girls, if you are as into not rocking the natural look as I am, your make up bag is very important. My make up bag is one of my most packed thing that goes into my bag. I am a huge fan of contouring and layered eye shadows and all that jazz, and with that there are a lot of different products and brushes that are needed to pull off my look. 

     Again I bought this bag at Ulta. I know that there are ones similar at Target and Walmart. I just like this one because the top and bottom pocket zip and there is ample amount of space to put all my brushes. It is only a bonus that it matches my other one. If you are a make up nut like I am, I would so suggest getting one of these! The whole nonsense of digging through one black pit of make up supplies is complete insanity. 

     Well there you go people! All my packing tips are all exposed. I cannot wait to see all y'all up at Moscow. Good luck on all the packing that I know FFA has out there for everyone! 

Peace, Love, and FFA!

McKenzie

When Life Give You Lemons

     Okay people, so I know that I am an AWFUL blogger. But life happened. Last week, I was working. I have been helping on my aunt and uncle's dairy, Heart-O-Rose Dairy. I was all pumped and ready to go and talk to all y'all about facing adversity straight in the face, when an emergency wandered its way onto the farm. One the Mont Billiard cross cows, was beginning to calve. In the past, she had no issues with the process, having healthy calves while being able to be integrated into the rest of the herd with no issues. But that day, I could tell that something was wrong. Seeing that she was having trouble, my uncle assisted in the delivery. Dairy calves, even half beef calves, are usually 50-60 pounds, but this was not a regular calf. This one, was more Mont Billiard than dairy breed, having the characteristic large head and broad shoulders, and on top of that, it was a bull calf. A 130 pound bull calf. By having a calf that big, two major things can happen to the mother, milk fever and/or nerve damage. Milk fever is when the mother is depleted of calcium, this causes temporary paralysis and without the right amount of calcium in the right amount of time, it can have lasting effects on her. Nerve damage is when a calf as large as the one she had pinches and smashes nerves, also temporarily paralyzing the back legs. This condition has no treatment other than steroids, which an organic cow like her cannot have, but with time the body with heal itself. It may take days, weeks, months, and could possibly never heal.
      So we could better take care of her, we had to move her to a clean area, out of the maternity pen. Using the assistance of hip lifters and equipment to lift her back legs so she could walk on her front feet to the hospital barn. Needing her colostrum to feed her newborn calf, my uncle and I milked her by hand and then gave her the necessary amount of calcium to help her if that was the issue at hand.
    As soon as she was administered the medications permitted, we waited. Soon the time zone for the calcium to kick in came and went, ruling out milk fever. And then the real wait game continued. Bringing her water, plenty of feed, and lifting her occasionally to milk her, all we could do was wait. For the next few days, she stayed where she was. It took almost a week before she was able to stand by herself without crumpling to the ground. Because of her not being able to move very far, we moved her calf to stay with her.
     She continues to do better day by day, but the unknown is still in the horizon. But in the end, that is farming.
      So that concludes why I am such a terrible and very inconsistent blogger. But the story came out to show that without farmers that are willing to make the sacrifices that are needed to keep feeding the world, the world would starve. Although my uncle is serving a niche market, he is still working day in and day out and going the extra mile to making sure that the cows in his herd are cared for. And in between all that, he was racing Mother Nature to get his seed in the ground before the heavens opened up and the rain came down on the drought ridden soil. Thank God for farmers.

Stay tuned next week for an ON TIME blog post (I promise) about how to pack for a week long trip in a small bag.
Peace, Love, and FFA!
McKenzie

Run No More - Nylon Edition

     First off, I am sorry for my being late posting. This last week was finals and it took all of my concentration to put forth the effort needed to get through the first part of this week. I am blogging to you straight from my new hammock.

No more camping on the ground or in the back of a truck, this girl is sleeping in quite the comfortable hammock from now on. Totally worth the money. Just saying.

     On to today’s post. This is another one for the ladies. We all know that one of the most inconveinient part of official dress is the nylons. But as I know many agree, they are a key part in making official dress look as shnazzy as it does. It just wouldn’t be the same. Now I know that putting nylons on are not fun. Those thin sheet of fibers are just contraptions of endless issues. You rub up against things, you get a snag (which you all now know that that can be fixed with fingernail polish). You pull too hard while adjusting, you tear a whole. You sit down, they fall almost off your butt. Even more annoying, when you do manage to keep a pair nice enough to last through a few events, they get caught by the Velcro of your make up bag or the zipper of your suitcase, the whole saving part is moot.

     So today is a two-for-one. I will show you the best ways to store your already opened nylons so that if they last through the day, they will see a tomorrow. Also I will demonstrate a sure fire way to keep those nylons up all day long.

     Now trust me on this one ladies, this sound odd but it works. During about this time of year, but usually a smidge closer to Easter, Walmart and other fine retailers, sell these plastic eggs. One half colored, one half clear. Nylons fit perfectly right inside that egg. And in their little shell of plastic-y-goodness, they are protected from rips and snags, and the egg is easy to transport full or empty, even more so making a lot easier to throw an extra pair of nylons in your purse. Cheap and resourceful those things are.

See, easy as 1,2,3!

     But McKenzie, how on Earth did you keep your nylons all day long? Well that is an excellent question you have there. One word, SUSPENDERS. Those long strips of elastic do a lot more than keep your pants up. By simply tucking in all undershirts and white button-ups, clip your nylons to your skirt. Unfortunately, I didn’t find this trick until I had gotten State Office and was given FFA suspenders. And what is even better (and I am sorry if it is a bit of too much information, but trust me it is a life saver), when Nature calls, removing and replacing your nylons is easier than you could imagine. But the best part is, because of the fact that you usually put your skirt in the same position, your nylons will do the same.

Adjust your skirt to where you want it, pull the waistband of your nylons up to match the skirt's.

Then just clip both waistbands together with your suspenders, they stay all day long. Honestly, I don't know why I went so long without doing this. 

     Here are a few little tid-bits of nylon know-how:

          1.  Spend a little more on reinforced toe nylons. A lot of runs start at the toe. The little extra in strings down there do help out a lot.

          2.  If you catch run starting to go up the top of your food and you catch it soon enough and put and end to it with your fingernail polish, the next day, considering the underside is okay, you can wear your nylons “backwards” from the day before. The run will be under your foot, and not a soul will know that there was even a run there in the first place. 

                   3.   If you wish to have a blacker look, tights are the way to go. They are also thicker and don’t rip quite as easily. However, I am not a huge fan of tights, I prefer to have a transparent look. But it is up to you.

                   4.  If you cannot find any black nylons, it is okay to settle for slightly grey ones over any designed ones. Grey at least looks close enough from a distance and most people won’t be able to notice. One of my teammates actually preferred grey nylons over black.  

     Well people, I hope that this post has been one that will help ladies defeat the unease about nylons. Find yourself a plastic egg and while you are there, pick you up some cheap, not super flashy I might add, suspenders. Keep it classy ladies!

Peace, Love, and FFA!

McKenzie  

P.S. If you have any questions on something, and want to know if I have a hack shoot me an e-mail at ffahacks@gmail.com. Also if you have any things that you have picked up and want to share, send me an e-mail and we will work together to get your hack out there and helping others!

Memorizing Like a Pro

     Although I never actually won as speaking contests, I loved them. But it wasn't until State office and the beginning of memorizing parts, that I realized my somewhat useful skill of memorizing speeches/parts.
      For those of who have never had the opportunity to take a glimpse at a State Officer's State Convention script binder, it is huge. Imagine a 2 inch binder jammed packed with stage set up, directions for awards ceremonies, and parts that have to be memorized. Without this "Bible" as we referred to it, State Leadership Conference wouldn't be possible.
     However, the weeks and months before, we are given our memorized parts.
     As daunting as it seems, I came up with a way when I was memorizing the creed, that makes it, at least for me, considerably easier to memorize.
     Now for those of you who don't know me well, I love notecards. I probably went through a 100 pack all on my own from the time we got script to the time we finished Convention. And what I did with these notecards is I would have a progression of my part. So on the first I would have the whole part that I needed to memorize. On the second, I would have just the first letter of each word in the part. And on the third, fourth, fifth, I would have just the first letters, but as they went on, I would leave out letters, forcing me to memorize the words that were in those spaces. Soon enough I would have just a blank notecard with the title of the part at the top. Now if I messed up on more than once on one of the notecards, I would simply go back to the previous one and work on it more, till I felt comfortable to continue on.
      I found that this method works especially well for parts like Opening Ceremonies, especially in high school when I was learning a new part every year. And for those longer speeches, like the creed, I would split it up into paragraphs and memorize a paragraph at a time and make it less daunting.

Here is an example of what I would do for my Treasurer Opening Ceremonies part

    When I was National Leadership Conference for State Officers, one of our facilitators was the great Ryan Best. One comment that he made about National Office was that he figured out the best way to memorize. He said that he would put his need to be memorized parts in a gallon sized ziploc bag and then stick it to the side of the shower so he could memorize while taking a nice relaxing shower. Now I don't know about all y'all, but I do some of my best thinking and memorizing in the shower. For heavens sake that is where I learn a lot of the songs on the radio these days as I attempt to sing along. Well people, I tried his way of memorizing. My addition to his tip was I got little sandwich sized bags and put my second notecard in there with it. The water from the shower makes the bag stick, while your notecards stay nice and dry. Honestly, it is the most ingenious thing that I have ever came across. 

    My final advice to all those who are trying to memorize a speech especially, the iPhone has a voice memo app preloaded on it. Now, when I was memorizing my retiring address, I just read each paragraph and made a recording. I also made a recording of my entire speech. I figured that since I could learn a new song by just listening to it several times, there is no reason that I couldn't do the same with my speech. Not even kidding, I listened to that speech several hundred times. When I would be driving to FFA events or even home (which is a 4 and a half hour drive) I would have it plugged into my cars stereo system. That is all I would listen to. Soon enough, I was able to say the speech along with the recording. 

      Although memorizing has been semi-simple for me through my FFA career, I know that there is always difficulty when it comes to remembering all those little words. Relax. It will come soon enough and you will sound amazing. 

      Good luck to all those Utah FFA members who are competing at their State CDE's this week. Good luck to all of you who are memorizing something for whatever reason. 

Talk at all y'all next week!

Peace, Love, and FFA

McKenzie