So Long Colorado

Welp, here I am sitting at DIA, flight delayed an hour (typical CO style). So I got a coffee and decided to blog for a little while. And Josh Turner just came on Pandora!!!! I absolutely love his voice, talk about a man's voice!!! I better move to the south to find something like that :)

With all my silliness aside, these last two weeks have been absolutely amazing! Besides my little sister, Courtney, I was able to see almost everyone I wanted to see in Denver/Loveland/Boulder. That includes my favorite boys, the Blake Street Bombers! (Rockies nickname for those out of town readers) I was lucky enough to get down to Coors Field 3 times over these two weeks. All three included one of my best friends, Kristina. (Check out her blog) She was even kind enough to share her bed 3, maybe 4 times when I came to Denver to hang out with people from college and didn't want to drive back to Loveland late at night.

Krissy and I typical Rockies pic :)

Great afternoon with my parents! Love them both so much!

Leaving Coors with Krissy and Kaylan (photo cred- daddy)

 I also got to spend some awesome time with Rachel, another bff!

Rachie and I after we Easter Egged a family friends house

and church at Flatirons in Lafayette with her momma

She came to pick me up and we went to the Rockies with friends old and new, it was a great time! I was lucky enough to be able to talk to Brittany, one of Rachel's good friends from Boulder. The girl is a KICK!! As we were sitting at Jackson's downtown before the game, Jes (DC school friend) and I were talking a ton about chiropractic school. Brittany expressed a lot of interest, as she was considering PT or PA school, but felt like chiropractic might be right up her alley. I think we might have her convinced about chiropractic, and it makes me so happy! Britt would make such a great DC and would bring so much fire, passion, and healing into any of her future patients lives. I hope she looks into it more! (that link on Rachel's name is to Rach and Brittany's blog, check it out)

Jes and I at Coors! In August I hope to be able to share the 

great state of CO with more of you DC kids.

This week I was also able to spend some awesome time with my mom at the gym! I was shocked that I actually made it to they gym at least 4 to 5 times per week. To conclude the week, this morning we did a kettle bell class at Fitness 19 in Loveland. I had done some basic swings with the bells before, but never a full blown workout. Those things are hard core! Cardio and resistance training at the same time. My legs are so fatigued, wow lets hope I can walk tomorrow! I am ready to get back to CA and start going to No Limit Boot Camp again! Anyone in the OC area, you should try it out! The Saturday classes are free for first timers, so if you want to join me, and get your booty kicked, please let me know! I am also excited to get back playing on my soccer team. I have missed the last two weeks, and am so excited to get back out there! I took a good 5 months off from playing soccer, and let me tell you it showed! But the last two games I played in, I felt like I got my groove back, nothing like schooling the 30 year old guy in coed who thinks he is Pele! 

One more thing, as an encouragement to myself and all of you! I read this on a friend's status update, and the quote hit home for me that day.

“Permanence, perseverance and persistence in spite of all obstacles, discouragement, and impossibilities: It is this, that in all things distinguishes the strong soul from the weak." ---Thomas Carlyle

When I read that, I thought, "That is it!" Not sure what else I can add to that one, but I hope to start 3rd term off on a strong note. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is what God wants me to be doing with my life! What a blessing and sense of relief, of which I am so grateful for. Keep on, keepin on right! Have a blessed weekend! So long CO... OC, see you in 4 hours!!

Beautiful view on the drive to Boulder with my daddy!

Love & Smiles

sammi d

Emulating Love

So I have recently become a little obsessed with reading blogs. I was talking to my mom about a month ago about how I wanted to start one myself. So why the heck not! I am not quite sure what it will really look like, but I think it will be a miss match of me! Think.. faith, family, CHIROPRACTIC, sports (from CO and OC), working out, and anything else that seems appealing to me at any given moment! I am definitely open to suggestions though. 


The inspiration for the name of my blog is the fact that I am a California girl (born and raised in CA until I was 12), with a Colorado spirit (lived there for 10 years), living once again in the OC (Orange County for those of you who don't know) to pursue my life long dream of becoming a chiropractor. Its been quite the adventure so far, and with 8 more terms to go (yes, over 2 and a half years), I know the ride will be fun, hard, exciting, rewarding, exhausting, memorable and irreplaceable! 


Over Valentines Day week, my school brought in this awesome speaker. Her name is Dr. Martha Nessler. She was hilarious! But more than that, her message has stuck with me ever since! She talked about a lot of different ideas, ways of thinking and was extremely inspiring. One thing she really hammered into us was to emulate love. That really stuck with me. Over the next few weeks I really tried to think about how I do just that in my life, and how I could improve. 

em·u·late/ˈemyəˌlāt/VerbMatch or surpass, typically by imitation.

When I read this, I thought Wow, the one person I can think of who loved like none other is Christ. My next thought was Crap, how do I do that? There is no way I could even compare!!! (obviously) This idea of emulating love hasn't left my mind since that day 2 and a half months ago. Although I can't say I have the perfect plan of doing this, nor do I implement this plan always (but I am striving, right?!), I have found that for me its being positive, smiling constantly, and encouraging the people around me. I always try and think, Hmmm, am I bringing the people around me up, or are they thinking "Oh, Sam just showed up.. bummer." I am going for option numero uno, of course. I think we could all learn from this emulating love idea. I hope this has encouraged you to maybe flash that person on the street a little grin. In my opinion, smiles are contagious!! 

This is one of my favorite photos from a trip to Uganda that I took over 4 years ago. (has it really been that long!) These girls were walking home and literally had the most beautiful smiles I have ever seen. With so little to smile about (at least in American minds) these girls brought joy to me, not to mention they looked awesome in their pretty pink dresses! PURE JOY

Love & Smiles

sammi d

PS- I think this smiling is the Colorado in me... People smile more here! So I am bringing it back to the OC, hence the name of my blog