He's coming home!

Here we are two years ago at the MTC. My little brother comes home from his mission tommorrow!!! I am so excited. He is so much fun and I have really missed him. I missed him calling me at 12:30 a.m. for help with his Spanish homework. I missed him riding his bike to my apartment. I missed seeing what he would dress up like for Halloween. Like this year he dressed up as a haystack...it was great!

I miss hearing about his crazy adventures like when he climbed Lone Peak in lederhosen and got on the news for waving around a giant flashlight. I miss doing crazy things with him like when we went swimming in the freezing rain in Uruguay and got spied on by the homeless man.

I miss seeing him getting into different cultural experiences like when he wanted to wash his clothes by hand at Adriana's house in Argentina. Or seeing him carry around his mate everywhere and wanting everyone he meets to taste it.

I have just missed him. He is one of the most easy-going, nice people I know. He has been a wonderful missionary and I know he has touched lots of lives there in Louisiana. But I'm happy he is coming home tomorrow.

A lot has changed in the past two years. Some of us look quite different than we did two years ago, and there have been some additions to the family.

He'll be coming home to three new siblings-in-law. And not to mention he is coming home just to go straight to Scott's wedding a few hours after he gets off the plane. (Don't ask.) Kyle has gotten about a foot taller. I have lost 30 pounds. Scott has gained 30 pounds. The dog has gained 30 pounds. Dad has gotten obsessed with triathlons. Allison is a senior in high school. Kyle is a sophomore.

Anyway, I'm just excited to have him back. And I'm glad I have this to look forward to in this week of crazy stressfulness and drama. Welcome home Nathan!

The Enchanted Ball

So this weekend was BYU's Homecoming, and my students were in charge of the dances. I was in charge of going to the Enchanted Ball at Thanksgiving Point. They had this whole Cinderella-type theme, and they did a great job!

They built this elaborate display of a castle staircase and carriage and they had tiaras to give to all the ladies. It was so fun watching the look on the girls' faces when they saw that they got a tiara. They barely got the display finished before people started arriving.

Matt was my prince and came to the Ball with me. We even went out to a fancy dinner before the dance. It was a lot of fun. But I was ready to go about 2 hours before it ended.

Matt did the best thing he ever could have done by surprizing me with a lovely corsage to wear to the dance! It was so sweet. We had a really great turnout, and my students really did an excellent job with this dance and all the other Homecoming festivites!

Also this weekend I went to the Hale Center Theater costume sale and found a fantastic costume for only $15! I am so excited. My murder mystery this year is going to be a medieval theme and this dress is so perfect for my role as Medeival Queen. I also found some fun decorations for the party. I love Halloween!

True Blue Football

It's Homecoming Week at BYU, and that means CRAZINESS!!! My students are putting on 11 events just this week. But of all the crazy events my students put on, True Blue Football is probably one of the coolest ideas I've ever heard of. First, you cover the field in blue foam...

...then you set up a giant slip-n-slide and cover that with foam too.

Then you watch all the crazy students slide down it. Over the course of the activity a huge blue foam pit forms at the bottom of the slide. This time it got up to about 2.5 feet deep.

Then you play flag football, volleyball, and tug-o-war in the blue foam.

Then you wrestle each other in the big foam pits all over the field.

It was pure craziness! But so fun! I cannot believe that little kid who is just sitting there in the middle of the foam. His parents must be nuts letting him in there with all the wild freshmen.

We did have two injuries. One sprained elbow and one broken arm. I was a little disappointed that I didn't get to go down the slide because I was attending to the injured. Oh well, it was still fun to watch. These pictures are from the beginning of the event, so you can't even see how much crazier and foamier it got later. With how crazy it was, I think going away with only two injured people was fantastic.

Let the Homecoming festivities continue!

The coolest T-shirt

I donated blood today and got this free T-shirt. Isn't it great? I love it.

General Conference

Once again, General Conference was fantastic! I still find it amazing every time that we actually get to listen to living prophets and apostles. I know that the Lord is aware of our needs and struggles and often gives us answers through the words of his living prophets.

Each Conference I make a list of questions I have or things that I am struggling with and pray for guidance and answers. And I always find the answers in the talks. This weekend did not disappoint.

My very favorite part of Conference this weekend was the announcement of the 5 new temples. Not only is one of them in Rome, Italy...which is a HUGE deal, but Argentina is getting another temple!!!!! In Cordoba, which is about 5 hours from where I served my mission in Mendoza. I am just so excited that those fantastic members are going to have a much closer temple. Right now they either have to travel all the way to Buenos Aires (about 16 hours). Or to Chile (about 9 hours, but only in the summer because in the winter you can't even go because they close the mountain pass).

I got a text from my very favorite family in Mendoza on Sunday morning telling me how excited they are about the new temple announcement there in Argentina, and how emotional everyone is because they feel so blessed. I am so excited for them. It also reminded me that I have a temple 5 minutes away. I need to go more often.

And now I need to save my money so I can go to Argentina for the temple dedication. That would be so awesome!

As far as the talks go, I loved Elder Wirthlin's, Elder Perry's, and President Monson's. I loved their counsel on how to deal with the stresses and anxieties of life. I just feel so refreshed and renewed. Three cheers for General Conference!

Insanity

I just signed up to run a full marathon. May 16, 2009. In Ogden. Bring it on!

If you are interested in participating with me, I have a training program for both the half and the full marathon. The training for the full marathon starts the week of Thanksgiving, and the half marathon training starts in January. You should be able to run 3 miles before starting the training. I've already gotten a few recruits. Matt, my sister Allison, and a few of my students. If we can do it, you can too! Here's the link for the race info.

Or you can just call me insane. I will probably be questioning my level of insanity throughout the next 7 months. But on May 17, I will be very proud. And probably very sore. But it will be worth it. I hope. :)

A peek into my job

Last weekend I took my students on a retreat to Huntsville. We stayed at one of the students' family cabin. Matt came too, and it was a lot of fun. We got to go on a horse-drawn carriage ride. It was reminicent of our wedding! I loved it!

We learned about horses and got to ride them. Mine was being very stubborn and just wanted to be with all his friends.

While on the carriage ride we saw a moose! We were headed straight for it. I feared for my life. Twice.

We made tin foil dinners. They were so yummy! Matt cooked all the tin foil dinners. All 25 of them. He is such a good man! I also made the most delicious dutch oven cobbler ever.

My student leaders did such a great job in their training sessions of the retreat. I was so proud of them! Then they stayed up til 3:30 a.m. playing DDR and Guitar Hero. I'm just glad they had a good time.

Saturday morning we went on this giant swing!

It was pretty sweet! We then toured the David O. McKay home and talked about him as a leader and some of his qualities and characteristics that we could apply to our own lives.

Matt was very excited to discover that David O. McKay was the captain of the University of Utah's first football team. He gave my BYU students a hard time about that. He also wore his Utah sweatshirt and my students gave him a hard time about that. :)

It was just beautiful with all the colors turning in the canyons. It was a great retreat, but I was very tired after it so I took a very well-deserved mini vacation on Monday.