"I SMILE because I scrapbook; I LAUGH because my husband can't do a thing about it!"

So Friday started out rather boring and crappy- cold weather, work all morning...you know...not fun stuff. But it ended quite nicely for me and so I thought I'd blog about it. So after work I headed over to a warehouse in Orem where someone told me they were having a scrapbook warehouse sale, so of course I had to go investigate and check it out and I'm very glad I did! It was for a company called "American Craft" which has AWESOME scrapbooking supplies but they're usually way too expensive for me, sad, I know. But this sale was FaNtAsTiC! They had everything between 75 and 90% off and I was just seriously in heaven.

It was a really bad place to go to all by yourself with no one to tell you to stop...I did call my sister Annie, who has a fabulous scrapbooker and is one person who would understand my excitement. She was excited and jealous but I'm a good sister and got her some stuff too. I tried to be good and not buy too much because I knew Mark wouldn't be too happy with me but it was SO hard! I got all of this stuff (see pics below) for 60 bucks! Which, if you aren't a scrapper, is AMAZING! Mark didn't understand how awesome of a deal this was but he'll get over it eventually :) haha...no really though, I really don't have to buy anything for a LONG time...I am SET with paper for at least 5 years :) or at least the childhood of our first kid (no I'm not pregnant, that comment was just for future purposes only).

Anyway, I have been scrappin' for quite a few years, I'm a very simple scrapper though, I don't embellish too much or do anything fancy. My main love is paper and I definitely got plenty of awesome paper, I love 99% of the paper I got, the rest will serve some purpose someday... :) I seriously got so much paper though!!! It was SO AWESOME!!!! Usually a piece of patterned paper is between $.30 and $1.00, for one piece, depending on the brand, thickness, etc. I got like 550 pieces of paper, 28 alphabet sets and a bunch of other stuff for the $60. So, just for fun, if you take an average of $.40 for a piece of paper and take that times 550, it's $220!!! So I think I got a dang good steal of a deal. I've been trying to justify my purchase to Mark but nothing's made him feel better yet. :) But oh well! It was a lot of fun though and I had even more fun this morning when I went through everything. I love paper! The only problem now is where to put everything...I had to buy a folder thing to put it all in but it's still everywhere. I might have to organize something to fit it all...I'm good at organizing, just ask any of my sisters :) haha...

Anywho- so that made the day pretty awesome. It got better though cuz Mark and I went up to SLC and went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas concert with my good, good friend Chelsea and her husband. She had called us up the night before cuz her mom gave her four tickets for it and asked us if we wanted to go. It was crazy, crazy, busy though so we got there with barely enough time to get in. It had already started but we made it before the opening prayer so I thought was good :) It was pretty cool though. They also have guest people that sing or do other things throughout the concert and this year they had a guy named Brian Stokes Mitchell, who I've never heard of really.

He was pretty good, he had an awesome low range but liked to go high too and then, meh...not so great. He also sang a couple songs that weren't Christmas songs so Mark and I were disappointed about that. He did sing a song called "Through Heaven's Eyes" which is from "The Prince of Egypt" (awesome movie!) which was way cool because he was the guy that actually sang it for the movie. He was the singing voice for Jethro, who was Moses' wife's dad. So that was awesome to hear, way good. He was really entertaining though, a very enthusiastic entertainer/singer, funny facials.

They had another guy too, Edward Hermann. I actually knew who he was, he played a character on the TV show "Gilmore Girls" and apparently he has done some narrations and stuff as well. So he did a narration of the story of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, who wrote the song "I heard the bells on Christmas Day". He did a really job with it too, he has a great voice for narrating.

The Choir of course was amazing, as well as the Orchestra (love them!). I especially like the organist, he was SO awesome! He played a song by himself, I forgot which, but it was so cool, his hands were going and his feet were going and it was just awesome. That would be so hard to play! They also had the bells which were cool too (a ton of people came out during certain songs and would play bells along with it). It was a pretty awesome night though, so good to hang out with friends and enjoy good music! Here's some pics we took.

"A professor is one who talks in someone else's sleep." -- W.H. Auden--

I do have to admit that I am guilty of falling asleep in class...some days you just can't help it, especially with some professors who have that "General Authority/Conference" type of voice, you all know what I mean...well not all of you but just imagine a nice deep, soothing voice giving a talk or lecturing and bam! You're out! That's what I mean :) Anyway, I thought that was a funny quote and I thought I'd talk about it. I also thought I'd talk about how this semester is almost DONE!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!! Can you tell I'm excited??? If not, I am SO EXCITED! It's been a long, hard semester and I am SO glad it's almost done!

Stats was one of the hardest classes ever but I had an AMAZING teacher who made it understandable, even to me, who does not understand that stuff at ALL. I've had classes that taught portions of Stats and they just went right over my head. But this teacher was just so good and really funny and very entertaining, which I think helped a lot! Most Stats teachers are the dry, boring type that put you to sleep but not this one! I sure lucked out with picking him. It's so hard to pick teachers! I've done pretty good so far, I've only disliked maybe one or two of my teachers in college.

For example...being at BYU you are required to take a certain number of religion credits, which is awesome. The teachers they have in religion are some of the best around and the classes are AMAZING! I've taken quite a few already and three have been with the same professor because I like him so much. He is just so awesome. His name is Alonzo Gaskill and he grew up as a Greek Orthodox somewhere near Kansas City (yay Missouri). He studied religion at Notre Dame and is extremely knowledgeable about world religions. He is also EXTREMELY sarcastic and fairly blunt/honest. So most people either LOVE him or HATE him. I'm one who loves him. He just has so much knowledge of religion and I have learned a lot from his classes. He also says the most random things and it is SO funny sometimes. Sometimes the things he says might sound a little outrageous/shocking/scandalous to some naive Mormon ears (don't worry it's nothing bad, but some people might interpret things he says the wrong way and think he's scandalous) but that's just how he is. He often says things just to contradict people and to get to the point he's trying to make or spark a discussion too which is funny. Some people started a fan club group on Facebook and put up quotes that he says from his classes. It's highly entertaining. Here's a picture from the group...I really don't know what he is doing though...

Anyway, off of that tangent, I'm sure most of you didn't really care about all that, but he's just so awesome! I'm just sad that I have no more classes that I can take from him, I'm all out. :( but yeah...so tomorrow is the last day of classes and then I have finals! So this past week has been crazy with me getting all my last assignments done and starting to study for finals. On Monday I sat in my room and worked on a research paper for seriously at least 9 hours straight, it was disgusting and awful but totally what I deserve for procrastinating :) I do that so well, huh Annie? She likes to make fun of me for my amazing procrastinating abilities. Anywho, this next week is going to be pretty crazy too with finals and all but I don't think they'll be too bad...as long as I study! :) Don't worry, I'm going to study.

Well, I guess this whole thing was fairly full of rambling, sorry about that! I'm just at work and am SO BORED! I already worked from 10-3 today, then went to class, and now I'm working 6-10 and it sucks! I don't have a clue why they scheduled me like that, but I don't like it. I've already done all the things I brought with me so I guess all I have left to do is watch a movie! Such a hard day at work! :)

Thanksgiving was never meant to be shut up in a single day. --Robert Caspar Lintner--

On to the second Thanksgiving! It was so great to be home, such a nice break from Provo! I'm really looking forward to the day I can leave it, not gonna lie. I love going home though, I miss it so much! I loved seeing my parents and all my sisters and my brothers and especially all the nieces and nephews! I got to see little Kady Scarlett for the first time but sadly only for a few minutes (Monie and Kyle spent Thanksgiving up in Nauvoo with his parents). She is a little doll though, SO cute and SO good! I'm excited to see her again in a few weeks. Then there's the twins and Santana who are all getting so big and more adorable every day! That Tani girl is just so cute and so funny! And she's so good! And the boys are so funny too, Matteo is so cute when he dances and the way he runs is just a hoot. Abrahm is so serious but when he does smile, it's too cute! He has the cutest little dimples and blue eyes with the CUTEST hair! I love it.

Then of course there's the older kids, I can't BELIEVE how big they are getting! Sierra is still gorgeous as ever, about to turn 15...eek! That's so crazy! Brian is almost as tall as me and can pick me up now...holy cow. Then Natalia and Carmen are definitely little pre-teens. They are SO loud together too! I took them with me to Wal Mart and it was just crazy. They're fun though and are such cute girls! A little sassy but cute... :) Jerica is so cute too, her hair is much longer than she usually has it and it's SO thick! My hair is like 1/16 of what she's got...so not fair :) She's hilarious though and says the funniest things and her stories are quite entertaining as well. She goes on and on and it's just so funny! I didn't see the other boys much but they're all getting big too, Mario is particularly funny. He has the funniest little phrases he says. It's a hoot. It was so great to see them all though, I'm glad I got this little extra time with them before Christmas. I'm sure Uncle Mark will steal some of the attention away from me...but that's ok, he'll have a fun ol' time with all the kids hanging all over him. It's gonna be great!

I loved seeing my sisters too. I miss them so much! They are, next to my Mamma of course, my greatest role models and I look up to them so much! They have such different personalities and characteristics and strengths and I admire them so much. I'm grateful how much closer I am becoming to as I'm getting older and married and such. They were laughing at me one day cuz they were talking about some recipes and I was like, these ones are really good! They said it's funny to see me all married and house-wifey. :) I've always been pretty good at domestic stuff so it shouldn't surprise them too much. Anyway, it was great seeing them and I can't wait to see them again.

It took us a while to decide what to do about Thanksgiving but we finally decided to just do it and then they could have another one or something when Mamma got back home. It wasn't the same without her of course but overall it turned out really good, or so I thought. I didn't contribute as much as I was supposed to cuz right after I got up that morning Dad was like, let's go, I'm going to see Mom. So I went up there to see her instead of helping out with dinner(I went up there everyday, 3 hour round trip, not fun but worth it!). I sorta helped with the cherry pies...sort of... :) Thanks Annie! She did a lot of the work and did a great job. I did a lot of the shopping so that was my contribution to the day.

Anyway, dinner was great, so yummy! The pies were delicious as well. Cherry cream pie is the best! minus the cherries of course :) After we ate, everyone kinda just sat around for awhile and then one of the Elder's read our thank you cards we do every year. Then for some reason they started a competition with this old school toy, the one where it has a ball on a string and you have to try to catch the ball in the little cup thing. It was kinda funny to watch, very random thing though. Dad was having fun with it though, he was pretty good too! They did this for seriously 30 minutes or so. It was nutty. After that we kinda ate some more and watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, a family tradition of ours and way funny movie. Overall it was a pretty good day, although I had to leave early the next morning to go back to Utah. And that's pretty much it for last week! I had a fun time with all my fam, especially the little ones and am looking forward to going back soon! Now for more pictures!

Mmm...Turkey and all the fixin's!
And the Rhino is back! Annie and Mellisa named her and decorated her for the holiday, although I forgot the name...I wanna say something with an R though...
The whole gang! Well, minus me cuz I was, as usual, taking the picture...and minus mom and minus Monie and Kyle and Kady...well that's still a lot of people!
Even more mmmm!!!!!!!! Pie!
Being Thankful
They are SO cute!
Natalia and Santana
Isn't this just the cutest picture??? This kid is a DOLL!
Aw...sisterly love!
Adorable little girl....Mellisa called me tonight and told me she's walking now! On the day before she turns One too...yay for Tani!
Storytime with Button! Such a funny little girl.
Where's Tani?
Abrahm likes to show people his belly.
Such a pre-teen... :)
Ok, I couldn't help but put this in there, I love it! I was lucky, for the third time in my life, to be by the base when it was landing, so awesome!!!

Thanksgiving, after all, is a word of action. --W.J. Cameron--

So now that I am back in Provo and Mamma is home and life is somewhat calming down, I am back to my old routine of procrastinating homework and doing this instead! I've been in class all day and studying so I think I deserve a little break. It'll take a couple posts though to cover Thanksgiving since mine was kinda split this year, but I'm sure you all are ok with that :)

The Saturday before Thanksgiving Mark, Amy, Calvin, and I went up to their aunt and uncle's house in Clearfield for a pre-Thanksgiving dinner. They were going to be out of town that day and so we just decided to do something then with them. I got to meet Mark's other two cousins, Chris and Russ and their families, which was fun. It was definitely loud and crazy there but that was ok with me cuz it felt like home. My family is Most definitely not quiet so Mark's small family is a little foreign to me sometimes but Aunt Janet's kids are much more like my fam. I got a lot of ripping on since I was the "new" person around, plus I'm from Missouri and people just can't seem to not make fun of me when they find that out. But I'm used to that too so I don't really care.

Anyway, dinner was really, really good and afterwards they set up Rock Band and played that until everybody left, which was a good long while. It was really funny though, people get so into it! Especially whoever is singing. That was the best part I think. The guys certainly had fun doing it. Chris' two kids, Porter and Lucy had fun with it too. Lucy really liked the microphone and started crying when someone took it away from her, it was so cute! She was a funny little thing, really shy around me since she didn't know me, but then I let her take some pictures on my camera and she softened up to me real quick. She kept me busy while everyone was playing the game (I didn't play at all although Russ kept trying to get me to sing...just ask my family, they know I don't sing in public...at ALL...just can't do it). They all had fun though which was good. Here's some pics of the occasion, I know you all have been missing my pictures...it's been awhile since I put any up. But don't worry, I took LOTS and LOTS last week so you're in for a treat. Enjoy!

All is right with the world!

My Mamma is home! I'm so happy and relieved! For her sake as well as my family's. She was SO ready to get out of there! She did not like it one bit, but who really does? Hospitals just aren't happy places unless you're having a baby and that can turn out not so nice sometimes too. But she's home now and that's all that matters for now. She's still on oxygen but on lot lower levels than before but she doesn't know how long she'll have to stay on it. We're all grateful that she's recovering so well though! We'd all be lost without our Mamma. I called her today, which is the first time in a long time I've got to call her! It was so nice! I missed calling her up, which I do frequently :) But that's ok, I think we've gotten a lot closer since I've been at college and the only communication we have is over the phone, so I really missed it! Seeing her at the hospital just wasn't the same. She's still got some recovering to do but she's got lots of help around home and I know she'll be well taken care of. Only 21 days until I go home again! Yay!

I am back in Utah which is great because I'm home with Mark and I missed him a lot but then not so great cuz I've got SO MUCH homework to do! I was planning on doing most of it last week but you can imagine how that turned out...I just don't know where to begin with it! But only 8 more days of classes left and then finals and then home. I'm almost there! This has been a long semester and I am going to be so glad when it's over. Anyway, back to happier things and Mark :) He missed me so much, poor thing! He's so cute though and SO sweet. He didn't think he'd see me cuz I had to work the day I got back so he left me a note on our bed which was very sweet. His sister Amy picked me up and we brought him food for lunch (so I did get to see him before work) and then she and I went shopping (Old Navy had AMAZING sales! Love it!). He came to work later and brought me dinner though and so when he got there he put everything down and went to take off his coat and underneath it were three pink roses! He surprised me quite well with that one. But it was so sweet and I loved it!

I'm really just saying all this to brag about him cuz we all know he's the favorite son-in-law and I'm just rubbing it in for my dear sisters...haha! Not very nice of me I guess but it's fun. It's the same with Annie and how she's the favorite sister...it's just a family joke thing but also somewhat the truth so no one can really deny it. :) I love my family though! Every single one of them. I can't wait to go home again! This time Mark'll really get to know the fam. He didn't really get to know them too well during the wedding, little preoccupied as you can imagine :) It'll be a fun time though. Anyway, I'm just rambling now mainly cuz I'm tired so I should go now. I'm just so happy my Mamma is home! I love you Mamma!!!