Do they match?

We are taking a poll. The question is: Do black and brown match? As in clothing items. For example, can you wear a black shirt with brown pants? Or black shoes with brown pants? Please leave your reply in the comments section. Thank you for your help.

Sniff, sniff

I'm sure you all know the outcome of the big game....very sad for me and very happy for Matt. We decided to have a little pre-game BBQ and here we are with our beverages of choice. :) Hee hee, we are so funny! We were going to take our little grill up to the stadium and have a tailgate party, but since it turned out just to be the two of us, we just had our party at home.

Matt did a great job at cooking our lunch and we had a really fun time. We decided that the loser of the game had to drink the rest of the winning team's colored beverage. It was pretty funny.

Here we are at the game. It was a really good game for the first 3 quarters. And then it got ugly. And it wasn't just the game. I'm trying to forget about what happened because it was so awful, so I'm not going to write about it, but I'll just put it this way. In my scripture reading this morning I found a good way to describe how things went off the field...

And it is impossible for the tongue to describe, or for man to write a perfect description of the horrible scene of blood and carnage which was among the people; and every heart was hardened, so that they delighted in the shedding of blood continually.... And they were driven and slaughtered with an exceedingly great slaughter, and their women and their children were again sacrificed unto idols.... And there never had been so great wickedness among all the children of Lehi, as was among this people. --Mormon 4

For the most part, everything and everyone was fine...just a friendly little rivalry, but I was just not prepared for the few idiots who have to ruin it for everyone. And I think it is very sad that football is not a family-friendly environment. However, I am very happy that I had a very happy husband!

Here is Matt celebrating with his sister and friends. After the game, we hightailed it down to Draper to go to my good friend Jared's wedding! We didn't have time to change out of our game-day clothes, but at least we made it before they left.

And I got to see my other good friend Kremer. We were all in the same BYU ward in college, and we had so much fun. After the wedding, we beelined over to our other friend's birthday party, and then to another friend's get-together. It was a very busy, but very fun day.

And, Matt got a new calling at church. He got called to teach Primary with me. Hopefully that will help. And hopefully he won't hate it, too! Is anyone else as excited for Thanksgiving break as I am???? Bring on the turkey!!!!

The Holy War

According to my friend Anne, tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of when it all started between Matt and me. If you'll remember, last year, Matt and I went to the Holy War together. I happened to have tickets, and I invited Matt to come with me. He was a good friend and I knew he would be so excited to be able to go to the game. So I invited him.

Anne thinks that I subconsciously liked Matt at the time, and that is why I invited him to come. I just wanted to go to the game and have a good time. Whether it was subconscious or not, it was a fun time. And for the record, I consciously started liking him the beginning of January.

Nevertheless, we both consider that game to be our first "unofficial" date. So Anne is right...tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of our first date. That being said, I am very nervous about tomorrow. I am scared that I'm going to be the only Cougar fan in the whole section of where we sit and I'm going to get ganged up on by everybody and I will be all alone! Matt has promised that he will protect me if people start being mean to me. Maybe I will bring some blue mustard gas or something as a self-defense weapon.

Plus, if we lose (which I hope doesn't happen) I will have no one to console me. And if we win, I will have no one to celebrate with. Maybe I will just have to go celebrate/wallow in sorrow (depending on the outcome) with the football team and the cheerleaders.

Anyway, all I have to say is....RISE AND SHOUT AND GOOOO COUGARS!!!!!!!!!!!! (Sorry, Matt.)

Indulgences

Our marathon training starts next week. So guess what we did last night? You might think we'd be working out or something to get ready to start training, but no! We went to Red Robin and ate hamburgers and french fries. Hee hee! Gotta get it outta the system before training, right?

On a completely different topic...I have decided that I think that single people are generally more outgoing than married people. For example, I went to ward choir last week and the single people there came up and talked to me and introduced themselves, etc. while the married people mostly minded their own business. Also, on the bus, whenever I sit next to a single person, they usually try to start up a conversation with me. The married people just sit there and sleep or read or something. On campus, the single people will usually say hello while the married people hurry on their way. I just thought this was interesting. What do ya'll think?

Progress

I would just like to announce that I am making progress...I made it through Primary yesterday without crying! They were actually a little better this week. Oh please let it continue!

And I also made a homemade apple cranberry pie. From scratch. And it actually turned out ok...a little dry...but ok.

And I am learning how to do flip turns while swimming. And I got a lot less water up my nose on Saturday than I did last Wednesday.

And I had a wonderful weekend. Matt and I went to dinner and bowling on Friday night...it was alot of fun even if I got creamed at bowling. Then on Saturday I got to go to dinner and play games with some girlfriends. It was great!

Name them one by one

I am trying to be better about counting my many blessings. After all, it is Thanksgiving season. But really, I should be more grateful for all the wonderful blessings in my life all the time. So I'm starting a list...

1. I have a warm place to live and food to eat.
2. I have a knowledge of the restored gospel.
3. God loves me!
4. I have a wonderful husband who loves me and would do anything for me.
5. My husband does the dishes and the laundry.
6. I have been sealed to my husband and my family.
7. I have a great job and job stability.
8. I got accepted into my grad school program.
9. The beautiful fall leaves.
10. A healthy body and the ability to do so much with it.
11. A good family who loves me.
12. The scriptures.
13. The ability to communicate with God through prayer.
14. A living prophet who receives revelation and provides counsel for us.
15. Good friends.
16. Medicine.
17. A good mind and all the opportunities I have to use it.
18. The freedom to choose.
19. My creative abilities.
20. A car that works.
21. The opportunity I had to serve a mission. (I went into the MTC 5 years ago yesterday!)
22. A sense of smell.
23. Talents.
24. People who believe in me.
25. I have a hard-working husband who supports me.
26. The atonement of Jesus Christ that gives me the opportunity to repent and try again.
27. Chocolate covered cinnamon bears!
28. Christmas time.
29. Technology.
30. The most handsome husband ever.
31. The opportunity I've had to see a lot of the world.
32. The ability to learn.
33. Challenges that force me to grow.
34. People who listen.

...there are so many things I'm grateful for. I'm making a goal to really focus on the blessings in my life. Happy Thanksgiving month!

Weekend highlight and some venting

This weekend we went with Caron and Raymon to the Organ Loft. It is a theater that plays old silent movies with organ accompaniment. The theater was built around the organ, so the organ pipes are inside the walls surrounding the audience. The organ is bright sparkly purple and gold. Here we are with the organist. It really was pretty neat. All the sound effects (telephone, sirens, trains, etc.) are controlled by this organ. And the organist sits in front of the screen and watches the movie and just plays along with whatever is going on. Now that is talent. It was just really cool. And it was fun to go out with Caron and Raymon.

That was pretty much the highlight of the weekend. WARNING: VENTING AHEAD. On Sunday we had to speak in church. Normally I love speaking in church, but this one was just really bad. I was stumbling over my words right and left and nothing coherent was coming out of my mouth. It was awful! And to top it off, I told the Primary president that I needed help so she got someone to help me and the kids actually BEHAVED for the new teacher! What is wrong with me? Why can't I handle controlling the 5-year-olds when everyone else doesn't seem to have a problem with it?

I think I am having an identity crisis. I just want to be good at something. It seems everything I try lately I am just not good at. I used to be known as the adventurous one, or the party-thrower, or the traveler, or the good Relief Society teacher, or the good listener friend, or the triathlete motivator. But now I'm not those things anymore and I'm just struggling in everything. My students are so much smarter than me and really could probably do just fine without me, I am having a hard time keeping up in grad school, I am no good at teaching Primary, I can't seem to make friends in my new ward, I feel like I'm losing a lot of my old friends, and I don't have enough time to do anything....ugghhh!

OK, vent over. Back to your regularly scheduled blog. Here's a happy thought....only 45 days til Christmas!!!

Bliss on a stick

I love caramel apples! And I love the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory! They have 12 different varieties of apples! Mmmm....

Halloween

This was the best costume I saw all day. They were chasing each other around campus and only moving in straight lines and making turns at right angles. And they had the PacMan music playing from their costumes. Isn't that great?

For the first time EVER since I left my job at CK last March, I missed it on Halloween. Halloween was always so fun at that job. It just wasn't the same this year. My students had some fun things going on, but I wasn't really a part of it. They decorated their area cubicle, which turned out really fun. One of the kids even stayed up til midnight the night before writing causes of death on gravestones for each of the students. It was hilarious!

A few of the students dressed up as our student body president. They stole his clothes and dyed their hair black. And since Adam is from New Zealand, they spoke in accents. It was so funny! And the best part was that Adam didn't know they had stolen his clothes.

Nicki was so cute. She dressed up as the Morton salt girl.

Here I am with my team. I really do love working with them, they are so great. And I really do love my job so much more than my old one. Chad was Chad Johnson the football player, Garrett was a gangster, Nat was Where's Waldo, and Liz was a ninja. They are so awesome!

They had a party in the office that day for all the students and kept talking about all their fun plans they had for the evening. It made me really sad because this is the first year that I wasn't invited to any parties or anything. Usually I have a bunch of things to choose from to do on Halloween.

So I went home and carved a pumpkin at least.

I was just sad that I didn't have anywhere to go so I could dress up in my costume. I had to go to Target to get some supplies and there was no one even at Target.

I guess next year I will just have to make sure I have some festive plans. I love Halloween, but this year was just kind of disappointing.