The Great Culmination

Finals finally culminated this semester of school. They were hard and unwanted, but I some how made it. To reward myself I checked 11 books out from the library. Two were John Grisham books and the other nine were the Little House on the Prairie series which I have begun to read aloud to Charles since he has never had the blessed opportunity to read them before. We also started reading "Our Search for Happiness" for an Sabbath day reading.

We really don't like shopping at Smiths because they not only do NOT have the best prices in town but they make you tote around a silly card to get discounts that everyone should get anyway. The only reason we went to Smiths was because they have a self-checkout that takes change--all change, even pennies. So everything we bought was Kroeger brand (the cheapest brand) and we brought almost all of our change. We stood there in line and put handfuls of change in at a time. It took forever. Lines started forming behind us. We ended up paying $13 of the $19 in change. That was fun in a wierd/different sort of way.

This was the first year that I have ever seen a Christmas program that ended early. It wasn't just a little bit early, but 25 minutes early. There were four songs and speaking parts. Charles was in the choir. He did a spoke as the donkey and did a splendid job.


During the choir, the little girl that sits in front of us and is in nursery, turned around and asked where my daddy was. It took me a second to understand that she was referring to Charles. I told her he was up in the choir singing. She thought that was neat.


During nursery this Sunday, I was teasing this same little girl by having the toy she wanted and keeping it away from her. She was quite smart and grabbed at my shoulder and slid down to my hand. She grabbed the toy and backed away while saying, "Neener neener, you can't get me!" It was hilarious.


Also during nursery we had a child begin to strip during singing time and say "Poopo." We pulled up his pants and I was elected to find his mom. Apparently they are in the middle of potty training.

Rice Krispie Wars

This week we:

Cleaned our carpets (with a carpet extractor)
Washed dishes
Tried to sell our BMW to a scam artist
Washed dishes
Cancelled our flights to Dallas (and got an extra $300 of flying credit!)
Reposted our car for sale
Washed dishes
Learned more about ASU's MBA program
Washed dishes
Made a scrumptious pizza
Studied guts out for finals
Washed dishes
Started a political corruption index/blacklist
Made the fanciest snowflake ever created
Oh, and we also washed some dishes


Annette took some pictures of our gustatorial adventures this week. The first is the pizza. It's our first time attempting a pizza and without any recipes. It was possibly the best pizza I've ever had in my life. It had a thick stuffed crust with mozzarella cheese. We had a homemade sauce with all sorts of spices and then, we put our favorites toppings--nothing but meat. We had bacon, ham and pepperoni. We hate it when you buy a frozen pizza and there's three pepperonis so we put on so many pepperonis that you couldn't see the pizza. Annette's picture is below.

One of these nights when Annette woke up and studied from 2 A.M. to 5 A.M., she found an email asking us to bring a dessert to a ward Christmas party. We thought we would make a family favorite from my Grandma Wanda. But our interest was piqued when we wondered if we could make it more Christmasy. We colored the marshmallows and the Rice Krispies and then we dipped them in chocolate. The result was pure and undefiled glory pictured below.

As I was consuming an Oreo recently, I found one that had been put together upside down. It's the first one I've ever seen like that. I wonder if it was a special package--one in a million--one in which we were supposed to win a trip to Cabo but since I didn't call it in we lost out.

Annette was meandering through campus when she stumbled upon a cool snowflake in the Wilkinson Center. She wanted to attempt one herself since it was cooler than the ones she made previously. Then, as is typical of her continuous improvement mindset, she took it to the next level and low and behold we now have the mother of all snowflakes.

Also, Annette wants to post her pictures of our car now that it's cleaned up. If any of you are looking for a Bimmer, we'll sell it to you only if you're local and and for a mere $104,512,674.

Winter Wonderland

It snowed today in Orem. Normally I find snow pleasant, but because of the BMW I curse snow back to the purgatory from whence it came.

Charles' Big Accomplishment: I made a bed foundation of sorts. A few weeks ago we put our king size bed up on cinder blocks and a $12 frame from Deseret Industries. We put some old nasty eclectic boards on the frame because we were too cheap to buy box springs. Please, tell me what the point of box springs are and convince me that they're worth anything and I'll give you $100. The problem with our boards was that our bed was sagging in the middle and it was KILLING my back. Annette has a back of steel so she wasn't bothered. So I spent $35 and built an intricate system of boards that are not only insanely sturdy, but they pyramid up towards the center. WOW. You should see our bed now. I've slept like a baby. It was fun to vacuum up a ton of sawdust.

Speaking of sleeping, there are nights when Annette wants to go to bed at midnight and nights she wants to go to bed at 6 and every hour in between. It's so interesting. She just goes to bed when she wants to--no looking at clocks or anything! I'm cool with that. It's been fun.

We went to an ASL session at the Provo Temple. It was great! I think I got as much out of the ASL as Annette simply because Annette was sitting clear in the back and had a hard time seeing the TV. But it was fun for both of us. I'm not sure if I've ever stated how amazing Annette is at learning ASL. I've rarely seen aptitude for anything like this. I'm glad the Spirit directed us in this matter. She's going to really bless people with that talent.

Annette makes this thing she calls Green Drink. It tastes quite good for being so healthy and for looking like the algae that collects around irrigation drainages. It's made by pouring some pineapple juice into a blender and then cramming a fat wad of spinach in there and blending it up. That's it. Somehow it works. We've made it several times and I imagine Annette will want to put it in our baby's bottles some day.

I have new schooling ambitions I think. I'm still working on the details and I'm still looking for a job, but I really felt the Spirit strongly when thinking about ASU. It turns out that not only is ASU's MBA comparable to BYU's in quality, but you can do 100% of it online. That way I can do an MBA from a top notch school and do it here in Utah while Annette finishes BYU. Of course it will cost as much as financing a trip to Mars, but hey, we can do it. What's $50,000? It's only the scariest amount of debt I've ever considered in my life.

Finals are coming for Annette. She's done well to study even with me home. It's hard to concentrate when all we want to do is talk 24/7. We're always raising the question in our minds, "Should I talk and laugh and goof off with the Spouse o' My Dreams or should I beat my head against books/whateverCharlesdoesallday?" It's a tough choice.

For a good time, click http://vimeo.com/7912759 (hint: it's got a missed tackle)

We organized our office...mostly. It's coming along but it's sure is tedious.

We watched all of the Harry Potter movies again because it's been so long since I saw the first ones that I can't tell the difference between Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, Star Wars, and all the Hannah Montana movies. They all have monsters in them.

Our sink got clogged. I think it was a mixture of me putting potato peels down it and Annette putting a lemon down it all in the same hour or two. We tried for days to get it unclogged and finally we just hired a plumber. You should have seen the disgusting pile of garbage that came out when we were trying to unclog it ourselves. We suppose that it's sludge that's been rotting in the pipes since the place was built over a thousand years ago.

It's looks like we might be having success at selling our car when we put it up for $1,500 less than blue book. We're hoping to find a killer deal ourselves in the switch and we might not have a car for a while if we sell it too quickly.

Ponderings in Palisades

Dear Family and Friends,

As I ponder this week, I am filled with a deep gratitude for a multitude of things.

THING 1:

This might be the most important thing. BYU beat Utah by the skin of their teeth (though we're praying the football players have decent oral hygiene). I'm sure you all know the gory details. BYU went up 20 to 6 and life was great. We thought the game was in the bag, when in typical BYU fashion we collapsed and let them come back 20 to 17 with mere minutes left. At that point I thought Annette would collect on our brand new life insurance policy (which we'll talk about later) when I died of an aneurysm. They tied it, the game went into overtime, Utah kicked a field goal and went up 23 to 20. BYU got a turn to overthrow the wicked Utes and had an amazing play, but it was called back for a penalty. Just when we thought they'd choke, Hall found Andrew George up the middle for a huge touchdown. The moral of the story...storming the field after a victory ROCKS! Annette and I lost all emotional rationale and went screaming down the stands, hurled our bodies over the fences, and went sprinting across the field to embrace our heroes. My sister Angela came, too, but almost got trampled to death when the football players muscled their way through the crowd and came right past us. Annette and I got to beat them soundly on their pads and boy did they smell like they had rolled around in the swine mire. The pictures below are as follows:

Picture 1) Everyone at the football game except Annette who was taking the picture (I look like a dufus)

Picture 2) Max Hall getting sacked

Picture 3) The scoreboard while we were rushing the field. Annette had a devil of a time taking this shot since her body was thrown around because she was in a mosh pit.

THING 2:

This thing is almost as large a blessing as BYU beating Utah (though nothing really compares). I got laid off. It was a dying company and my boss laid me off because he knew his head was on the chopping block and he had to get rid of me before he got it himself. My coworkers were horrified, but I had a sweet assurance from the Spirit as he and the secretary were telling me about it that this was a good thing that was supposed to happen.

I learned a lot working there, but I got to a point where I stopped learning because they were demanding busy work from me. I've always been interested in entrepreneurship and now I definitely know how NOT to run a business. I got to a point where I was stuck in a rut; it was awkward for me to quit or get fired for telling off my boss to his superiors for his indiscretions. I am incredibly proud of how well I performed on the job and for my advancing in continous improvement intiatives with NO INCENTIVE WHATSOEVER from management. I don't doubt that new employment is right around the corner.

How big is that corner? I don't know. Some of my friends have been laid off recently and got new jobs. The fastest turnaround I've seen was five months. The longest turnaround...well, over a year and they still don't have a job. I really think I'll find something good. I've seen some great offers for which I'm not only qualified but perhaps OVERqualified.

Unemployment isn't all bad. An aquaintence calls it Funemployment. It's nice to spend so much time with my wife and make more than two college students make combined. Also, we're SO excited to go see David return from his mission and not have a worry in the world about getting time off. Annette's school schedule is now our constraint. But speaking of school...

THING 3:

Another blessing of getting laid off is that it forces me to get my MBA which I've been dying to get since before graduating from diapers. Some of the big questions now:

Which school do I go to?

Does school reputation REALLY matter?

How much do we want to spend?

How fast do I want to accomplish this goal?

We DON'T want to go into debt (since we currently have none), so how do we accomplish this?

There are all kinds of questions, but we're working through them. I've started studying with a friend for the GMAT and we'll probably take it early December.

THING 4:

We're looking to get a new car. Since we refuse to go into debt, we're looking at trading the BMW straight across. It's now worth $4,000 less than when I bought it a year and a half ago. That's depressing. We're hoping that we can get a car that has more room inside, towing capacity perhaps, and most importantly can drive in the snow. We also would like an automatic since Annette hates driving a manual and downright refuses because it scares the fool out of her.

THING 5:

Speaking of Annette, I LOVE HER SO SO SO SO SO MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

THING 6:

We finally got a life insurance policy on me. I'm now worth much more dead than alive. There's a self-esteem booster for ya. Annette said she still wants me alive though. I can't imagine why. We'll probably take out a small policy on her, too, once we have kids which brings me to...

THING 7:

ANNETTE'S not PREGNANT!!!! Ha. Fooled ya.

THING 8:

Thanksgiving Day was neat. We went bounding through the woods. My family usually takes a hike and this one was a typical one. It was 6 miles through the freezing cold snow. Annette thought hiking in California was bad. It's better in Utah because your body goes so numb as it enters hypothermia that you don't even realize that you're about to die. Annette made a snow angel as pictured below. I did some interesting things in the snow, but we won't talk about them. She got some other great pictures which we hope you'll enjoy.

Thus it is. The End.

ASl Movie, All About Me

For my ASL class I had to make a movie all about me, so here is what it came out to be. There are no words, just sign, so I provided a transcript below. Capitalized words are spelled out and to just warn you, I wrote my thing out in ASL grammar, so don't think that since I have been in college that my grammar has gone to pot. Enjoy.

Hi, I ANNETTE MARTIN

My family lives in California. I youngest, born DEC 28. Oldest of four my sister COLLEEN. She married 3 children girls. Cute. 2nd oldest, brother, EVAN, intern Atlanta, Georgia. 2nd youngest DAVID, missionary in GUADALAJARA Mexico. Dad mom divorced. My mom, SANDRA 2nd marriage DEC. New husband, LARRY my new dad from Wyoming. I happy for my mom. JACQUES, my dad French, talks French good. I know little bit French enough talk with my Grandma Grandpa from France.

When I short I had 4 dogs, 5 sheep, 7 chickens, 1 goat, 30 rabbits. I love animals. I wish had dog, but no area for dog. I love to draw, paint, but not good, I practice. I like water paint best. I like photograph, I have many many photos. I like sew clothes myself, but time (not) enough, busy. I excited snow My major, Communication DISORDERS.

I married, my husband, he CHARLES. He wonderful husband. I met him 1 year past. When I visit my best friend, ROSE, she introduced him me. We live Orem, basement APT. He finish school. He engineer. He talks German Russian. He now learning Chinese. He smart. We love watch BYU football.

Finished

Little more:

My husband I play with children church in married student ward

I love to clean the house

My husband loves cook bread bacon meat

but I like to eat salad

Now Finished

A little catching up

Last Week (it was written last week, but I just forgot to post it)

We have been in desperate need of more storage space so we bought a $12 bed frame, 6 cinderblocks, and planks of wood from Charles’ dad. We now have our bed raised quite high with lots of storage space we are filling up quickly. It is nice to have more room and so thing aren’t so cluttered in other areas of our apartment.

On Thursday Charles and I held a Russian dinner at our apartment and had my three cousins over. It was lots of fun.

The next day after the dinner we had run out of forks, so here is Charles using the last remaining fork which is usually used for serving food, not eating.

On Friday Charles and I went to the movie theater to see our first movie at a theater together. We saw Harry Potter at the dollar theater. I really enjoyed it and am so excited for the last and final Harry Potter movie.

The BYU vs. Wyoming game was a nice and easy shut out of 52 to nothing. We were quite excited, but felt bad for Wyoming.

My mom and Larry came over Saturday evening and they got to try the Russian food that Charles had made. It was fun too see them again and talk to them.

Saturday evening we spent with our good friend Rose.

This Sunday we had the Primary Program and although we usually have 10 kids in Nursery, we only had 4 little kids today that came up with their parents to sing two songs. But it was nice to have so few kids in Nursery because that meant that Charles and I were able to attend actual classes. It was nice to hear all of the announcements in Relief Society and to know what was going on for the next month.

This morning I wanted English Muffins for breakfast so I found a recipe online for them and made a large amount. They were so yummy that we now only have two left.

This Week:

Charles and I were on campus one evening and we saw a guy wearing cargo shorts on a cold day which is weird, but not too weird, but then we noticed that he was wearing leggings under his shorts. Its weird enough that girls wear leggings, but when a guy does, that is just too much.

This week Charles decided to grow out his facial hair once to see how it would be. He didn’t grow it out very long, but it did get long pretty fast. So here is a picture of half of his hair shaven off.

I had an ASL Club meeting this week about becoming an interpreter. Unfortunately, the interpreters that were signing the whole time did not talk at all. I consequently missed most of what they were saying, but it was good practice in watching people sign. I did pick up on the signs that I knew which is always fun to know that I know a little bit of what they were signing. Although I didn’t understand most of what they signed, I did learn a lot through their body language and am excited to become really good at signing and would love to become an interpreter. I have started doing a lot more studying and looking up all sorts of signs online to be able to sign more things.

This weekend was Dancesport at BYU. Although I am in DANCE 181, County Western, I did not participate, but I sure had a lot of fun watching everyone perform. Everyone did so well in performing. Charles was so kind as to stay to the bitter end of it to see the little kids perform and the world famous people perform. We didn’t have any chairs to sit in and consequently stood for about four hours watching people dance.

For the BYU vs. New Mexico game this week, we went to Santaquin to watch it. But by half time it was snowing (the first real snow of the season) pretty bad and decided we better get home before we got stuck on the roads.

Charles was making the filling for three pumpkin pies at the same time, but he accidently 6 times the sugar instead of tripled it from the recipe. So he had to dig out half the sugar he put in, it was quite amusing. But he does believe that he got most of it out although it seems a hair sugary then it is supposed to be.

Halloween

This week has been a fun week!

Charles has been studying for the GMAT to apply to get his MBA starting next fall. We are really excited for that!

On Thursday we had a dinner group with two couples in our ward. It was lots of fun and it is exciting to get to know more people in out ward.

For the fall season Charles and I decided that we would make pumpkin pies from scratch, we unfortunately didn't realize that you don't need a really big pumpkin. So we now have a lot of pumpkin in our fridge waiting to be made into tons of pies. We will probably be having pumpkin pie through Christmas, but thankfully we both love it.

For Halloween Charles and I drove up to Boise, Idaho to visit my sister Colleen and her fun family. It was such a fun vacation for us. Halloween is so much more fun with little kids. We went trick-or-treating with them and had a blast. The little girls really warmed up to Charles much faster than they did to me. Our drive both ways was uneventful besides some awful traffic in random areas and kind of getting lots due to the fact that I was the navigator and am still not used to using exit numbers versus names for exits.

That was our fun week, until next time.

A busy week

This week, I have been taking midterms, not the most fun thing in the world, but it is exciting to really understand everything I have been learning in class and make lots of connection in the material. I seem to have a lot of moments where the light bulb finally goes on.

The TCU vs. BYU game was a depressing game since we just killed ourselves. It didn't help when we left the game early at the end of the 3rd quarter and we still hit a lot of game traffic of people leaving early.

Charles has been asked by his work to go on a business trip in February to Dallas, TX. I am allowed to go with him, but Klune wont pay for my flight, but we figure we can still make a pretty fun vacation out of the trip. I have never been to Texas so it will be lots of fun.

In Nursery we have two new couples that will be with us, so hopefully we will be able to have some Sundays to go to our classes for the 2nd and 3rd hour.

This week has been pretty busy with school and regular life things and I think that is all for now.

Just a Little Fun

Nursery this week was so unusual. There were no major rabble rousers and as time progressed we lost a lot of kids who were leaving early. By the singing time, we had 8 adults and 4 kids. It was a pretty easy Sunday.

As some of you may know, I am taking ASL and am part of the ASL Club. This week we had a deaf panel where we could ask them any sort of questions ad they would answer them. There were a lot of different type of deaf people. We had a woman that went deaf in her 30's, a person hard of hearing, a person who was deaf when born, a deaf person who had an implant for him to hear, and a person who learned ASL once born since his older brother was deaf. It was interesting the different view points that they had because of their backgrounds. It was neat to see that none of them feel restricted by their lack of hearing. One interesting thing that I learned was how deaf people give blessings. They start the blessing with their hands upon their head, sign the person's name with one hand and then take both hands off and sign the blessing for the person to see. They put their hands back on the head to end the blessing. They said that is the general way they do all ordinances, it has to start and end with the hands in the correct spot.

Well, that is all I can think of right now. Charles and I are having lots of fun and are doing great.

Charles' Birthday & Annette's Wisdom Teeth

Charles’ Surprise Birthday Party

October 6th, Tuesday was Charles’ 29th birthday, so I decided that I would make it into a surprise. Charles new that I was keeping secrets about his birthday, but only thought that it was about his present. So, this is how it all went down. The morning of his birthday I put Charles’ present in the back of the car and told him he wasn’t to look in it. I also told him that instead of picking me up after school, that I would meet him at the duck pond just south of campus. Charles suspected that there may be a surprise there, but there was none. We chatted for a while about our days and then I let him open his present. He was so surprised when he found 29 different types of candy in the picnic basket. We ate at J Dawgs, which is one of my favorite places. I told Charles that we had to be at Rose’s place precisely at 6. There was no reason to be there exactly at 6, but it threw him off. He figured that there would be some sort of surprise there, but no. We sat and talked to Rose for and hour and as we were leaving Rose got in the car with us. Charles’ didn’t know what to make of. We got home and as he went in our entire apartment was filled with family and friends. It surprised Charles and he didn’t know what to think. The evening was really fun and went wonderfully!

New Phone

I finally joined Charles’ T-Mobile family plan with him once my awful contract with Sprint was up. It is so exciting to have a real phone and I can text too. I thankfully still have the same phone number.

Wisdom Teeth

My worst fear of having my wisdom teeth ripped out happened Thursday evening. We went to Stone Haven Dental, which I highly recommend, to have it done with IV Sedation, with one of the lowest prices for wisdom teeth and the best quality. Charles was my designated driver for the event. Before they stuck the IV into me they asked if I wanted a little bit of laughing gas to calm my nerves, most people love it, so I thought I would try it. Unfortunately it never kicked in, even after they turned it up higher, nothing changed. On the way home I apparently was sad it didn’t work and told Charles four different times that it didn’t work and it just made my nose numb. I told him for a 5th time the next morning when I woke up as if I hadn’t told him before.

Once they put the IV in me, I was down and out. Charles related the rest to me the next morning once I was cognizant. After the procedure was done, I would not wake up from the sedation for about 10 minutes. Dr. Tobler said it was a little unusual. My body was completely limp with absolutely no muscle being used at all. They had a very hard time putting my jackets on me with no help from me. I did keep rubbing my eyes though. They said that while they were waking me up that I would open my eyes, but seemed to look right through them. They eventually got me into a wheel chair and Dr. Tobler rolled me out to the car, but I was so limp that he had to hold my head upright so it wouldn’t fall over. Charles picked me up out of the wheel chair and as gently as possible dropped me in my seat. Although I was mostly asleep, I did request that my seat belt be put on. That is one habit that I would have to be dead not to hold on to.

On the drive home I could only make stop consonants with vowels, aka: garble. Charles would have to ask me to repeat things continually so that he could understand. Most of the time he never understood my garble, but when I really had something to say, I tried really hard. I would every once in a while get out a really word, like hot. Also while driving I started to use sign language to communicate to him, but I would continue to finger spell “say.” Charles thought that I had been trying to communicate something about my eyes hurting, so he didn’t understand the correlation between the ASL and English. He asked me to sign something else, but I was stuck with “say” in ASL.

When we got home Charles tried to get me to walk with his help, to make me wake up, but after a few steps I complained that my legs hurt, he thought I was going to collapse if he didn’t pick me up. I gave a half effort to jump into his arms, but it didn’t help at all. Charles thought it was cute that I would try to jump into his arms. He got me into the house and had me lay on our couch.

I was slightly waking up, but still don’t remember much. I asked to be put in my pajamas, but I had so little energy that I started just shaking from using so much energy. It was weird for Charles to see me go into mini convulsions from doing such a simple task. At home, Charles’ mom and sister came over to give us dinner, but i didn’t realize it for a while because I had such limited vision and only knew they were there because I could kind of hear them. Charles gave me a bowl of mashed potatoes to eat, but he put a fork into it, I normally wouldn’t have cared, but I just wasn’t awake and got perturbed that I had to use a fork. I although did have a distinct thought, "Charles has probably done a lot for me, since I am apparently home, so I guess its okay."

While being slightly cognizant, I asked for my chapstick, as Charles was putting it on, I wanted more and felt that Charles wasn’t doing a good enough job, so I decided to do it myself. Unfortunately, my motor skills were severely lacking and I was applying chapstick to my entire lower half of my face. It also didn’t help that my face was numb and I didn’t really know where my lips were. Charles kept trying to help me and I kept trying to do it on my own because I truly believed I was doing a good job. In the little struggle, I dropped the chapstick on the floor.

It was a very interesting experience to hear the stories from Charles the next morning of all the things that I did after the surgery. I am getting better and haven't swollen too much.

The actually taking out of the wisdom teeth went well and only one broke, but it went beautifully. Charles’ mom, Jan, took care of me on Friday at her home while Charles was at work. Charles took care of me on Saturday. Saturday was by far the worst day because I am apparently allergic to some of the medication that made me itchy. Sunday my appetite came back, but my energy was still a little low.

It has been wonderful to have such a carrying husband who thinks I am beautiful even without wearing any make up for the last few days. He has been helping me so much and wakes me up during the night so I can take my medication. One night he even stayed up with me for about an hour since I was in such pain and could not sleep.

Charles is very happy with how the UNLV vs. BYU game went down with a total killing of the Rebels.

Our fun week

This week for the Martin family has been lots of fun!!

On Monday we had a birthday dinner at Sam Hawk which is a Korean restaurant. It was my (Annette) first time ever having Korean food and I LOVED it. My favorite was Duk Poki (that is at least what Charles said it was called).

On Wednesday we went to a little birthday party for Charles’ nephew, Matin, which was lots of fun. Seeing family is always great. Also, Wednesday was the first cold day. On Tuesday it was 80 degrees and on Wednesday it was about 40 degrees and just south of Provo it snowed! Winter will be here very soon.

On Thursday we attended the BYU Football Fireside which are held before each football game that they play. I happened to read in the BYU newspaper that it was going to be held, I had never been to one before, but Charles told me about them a while ago, so I figured it would be fun. It was great to hear from the football players one night and see them play the next evening.

On Friday, we saw my Mom and Larry who had come up to Utah for the BYU vs. USU game. Larry is a USU fan, but we will convert him to BYU soon enough. It was a pretty fun game and I of course took my camera to try to get a few good photos from such a distance.

This Saturday, Charles had to go into work to help with the inventory that had to be done. Thankfully Rose came over and kept me company during General Conference. Charles did come home half way during the second session of General Conference. It is always better to hear the words of the prophet with the one you love. Conference is by far one of my favorite times of the year and am thankful for the opportunity to be able to watch it on the tv in the comfort of our own home.

On Sunday between session Charles and I went for a walk up South Fork (I think that is the name) which was absolutely gorgeous! Fall has definitely come.

Language Development

Language Development is by far one of my hardest classes and I am struggling to understand a word in the book. Dr. Fujiki gives out study guides for each chapter which helps immensely to know what we have to know. Although I can find where the answers are in the book, I usually don't understand what it means. Our TA who is getting her Masters at the moment said that the book is quite hard to understand and even a bit hard for her. So, last week, I studied and tried to understand what it said for the quiz, but I ended up getting 3/15 points on the quiz, a little bit of a bummer. But on the quiz we took on Thursday, I got a 15/15!!! I was so excited when I checked my score online this morning. I am so excited that I am doing a little better.

Filled Week

(Annette) Life wasn't too exciting this week, but we sure kept busy with the many things that always seem to happen. I had a NSSLHA (National Student Speech Language Hearing Association) Club meeting for my major. On Thursday I visit taught both of my sisters in the ward. Life is very fun and rewarding. The only bummer about this week is that I was going to finish writing a paper on Isaiah on Friday, but of course I left my resource at home and now get to finish the paper this Monday. But also last Friday, we went to a birthday party for the wife of one of the families that Charles home teaches. It was lots of fun getting to know them better.

(Charles) We went to the temple. While this isn't highly unusual, it's one of our goals I'm glad we're achieving. We make it at least twice but usually three times a month. Someday when we're perfect at getting three in, I think we'd like to do weekly.

The BYU football game was OK. We came out pumped up and took advantage of the other team's nervous mistakes. I kept trying to get Annette to go to my grandma's house with me at halftime because I knew how much homework she had. She insisted that we stay and I'm glad we did because I would have been worried sick if I had been listening to it on the radio. We didn't pull away from them quickly and decisively enough until the end. I don't think we looked a ton better than they did for most of the game. Heck, their quarterback looked as good as ours. I'm glad we aren't going to somehow make it to some huge BCS bowl because I'm afraid we'd collapse under the pressure. We'll see if my opinion changes after the TCU game.

A Tribute to My Dear Sweet Wonderful Amazing Wife (and our parental units)

This weekend was quite a roller coaster. There was a thrilling 300 ft climb on Friday night when we went to Cirque de la Symphonie. I can't begin to describe how incredible that was. Then we hit the peak of the roller coaster (you know, that part of the ride that's not fun in and of itself, but it's a transitionary stretch to the next part) when we went to the World of Dance concert. It was OK, but really it was mostly just boring which is weird because usually I LOVE World of Dance. Then, there was that decent where you toss your cookies over the side of the roller coaster and plaster all of your friends behind you with puke. That was Saturday night when my worst nightmare came true and FSU spanked BYU like a red-headed step child.

On Valentines Day, I told Annette that one of the reasons I love her is because she is cultured and versatile. I shared a quote with her that I will share with you. Elder Callister said it so poignantly. "On the eve of his release, one of my fine missionaries during my tenure as a mission president spoke of a girl at home with whom he intended to renew association.

He inquired, “How will I know if she is the right one?”

I suggested, among other things, that he invite her to a cultural event. If she responded that this would be of no interest to her, then maybe he should pursue other alternatives. But if she had compelling spiritual qualities and could be enthralled by culture on Friday and love the athletic contest on Saturday, she might be the type of young lady he could choose as the mother for his children. It might be balanced and rewarding to be paired with her for eternity."

Annette was enthralled by culture on Friday and she at least pretended to love the athletic contest on Saturday. Heck, she probably loved it a lot more than I did. She even pretended to be really upset when we lost to make me feel better. How cute.

And now, a hearty thanks to our parents for raising us in such a way that people don't think we were born in a barn. Our parents taught us that we choose our disposition and how to live a vim life of exciting events. Or, we can be cantankerous curmudgeons. We are so blessed by our wonderful families (and friends) and hope that we can pay you back in some small way.

Fun Week

This weekend Charles and I went to the Utah Symphony's concert "Cirque de la Symphony." It was an awesome mix of the orchestra and acrobatics. We absolutely loved the show and wished you could have all seen it.

(an internet photo)

Our fridge acts more like a freezer and froze some of our eggs even though the fridge's temp is completely turned to the warmest setting possible. The little tuft on the right of the egg is part of the egg carton that froze to the egg when it cracked and started seeping out.

Here we are in the sea of blue BYU fans who became deeply saddened by the loss of BYU to Florida State 54 to 28. We were slaughtered.

This is a pretty cool shot of the game that I took at the BYU Football game. Sorry it isn't great, it was completely across the field and I still had to crop it down and do a crude blurring job of the background distractions so you could see what was actually in the picture.

Charles was so uninterested in the game when BYU started their down hill game that he started texting people (so weird that he wasn't paying full attention to the game).

Hike to Stewart Falls on Labor Day Morning

Charles and I went on a hike up to Stewart Falls Labor Day morning as the sun rose for the morning. It was a beautiful way to spend the morning. There were no one there at the Falls until after I got most of my photos. The Falls were absolutely spectacular and lovely!!!

I don't know why the photos are on here so weird, it looks a lot better then it was.