Fun Weekend...

Troy and I had a fun, and quite busy weekend.... started Thursday evening with babysitting Avery. We all went out for some dinner and then went back to the house for some Kung Fu Panda. One of Troy's (and my) favorites, and Avery seems to like it lots too. :)Next we went to Repertory Dance Theatre's show, Chairs. It was an excellent show and we thoroughly enjoyed several of the pieces. There were also a couple things we didn't care for, but thats the nature of any show. Several people from Ririe-Woodbury were there that night too (all our dancers, the development director, company manager, founder, etc) so it was fun to see all of them!

Saturday morning we attended the baptism of our Friend Buck's son, Colton. Colton is growing up so fast! Can't believe he is already 8! The baptism was very nice - his older sister McKaleigh gave a very nice talk on baptism - and it was fun to see Buck, as we had not seen him in a few months.

There was also a Symphony concert this past weekend. It was titled, The Hero's life. It was a Dvorak piece and some Strauss as well. The cello soloist from the Dvorak piece also sat with the orchestra to play the Strauss pieces which was VERY COOL! The soloists don't do that very often anymore, but apparently it was very common back in the early days of the symphony.

Economic challenges are unfortunatey hitting all of us rather hard, but many of the performing arts organizations are having an especially hard time. The Utah Symphony Utah Opera is no exception to this. They just reduced everyone's salaries by 10% and the musicians agreed to also take pay cuts of 11%. In fact, the orchestra agreed to donate 2 weeks of time to show their dedication to the future of the symphony. Last night was one of the nights when the orchestra was working for free. We felt so honored with their generous gift to the audience.

Reminiscing...

Wow… never thought I would care about rain sensing wipers and a back up camera, but they just happened to be on the car that was in the color I wanted so… we have them! Have been using them lots in the last 2 days, and boy are they awesome features! :) Love them!

Anyway… I was reminiscing last night about the adventures we have had in the Volvo and I thought of one story that most of you have probably not heard… Troy tells it better than I do but here goes anyway…

Just a couple months after Troy and I met and had started dating (in April of 2006), I was going camping in Virgin, Utah with a bunch of friends for the weekend. Troy really doesn’t like camping and wasn’t planning to come… but I begged and pleaded and said it wouldn’t be nearly as fun for me if he wasn’t there. He was still hesitant but said he would think about it. It wouldn’t be easy for him - he had the girls that weekend, his car wasn’t running very well, he had no sleeping bag, wasn’t sure he could get off work, etc. I said I would pack an extra sleeping bag and extra food just in case, and I left the keys to my car so that he could drive it down if he decided to come. I even printed out the directions to our super secret camp site and headed off…. With the hope that he would come join us the next day.

We sent texts back and forth while Erica, Ethan and I were driving down there, and the next day when the whole group headed off to Sardine Canyon (There is very limited cell service at the campsite). We talked a few times and it was sounding like he wasn’t going to make it. I was very sad and when we got back to the campsite that afternoon I was totally bummed as he and I had gotten cut off on the phone when I went into a dead zone.

Our friend Buck was talking with me when I got back to the campsite and was helping me carry stuff back to the tent. He was rambling (or so I thought) trying to distract me from how sad I was, and mentioned something about hippopotamuses… I didn’t blink and eye and started telling the story Shelly had told me about the Rhino’s in Africa hanging out in the shade of the tents. I bend down to put my things in the tent and than stand back up. Then I paused because I realized that I had seen a large pair of shoes sitting on my sleeping bag, and they were obviously not mine… I lift up the tent door to see Troy in the tent. I screamed and literally dove into the tent to hug and kiss him. I was so very excited! And he said that my reaction made the torture of camping well worth it! :) Haha!

Little did I know that Hippopotamus was the “code word” Buck was using to tell Troy we were on our way to the tent…. And I hadn’t even noticed my car sitting off in the trees just a little ways down… Haha!! It was the BEST surprise! :) I couldn’t stop smiling the rest of the day… Possibly the rest of the trip! (Thank you Colleen for encouraging him to come! And for watching the dogs!)

And here is Troy with his "super" side kick Buck.... the silly things we do while camping.... Haha! P.S.
Yikes... someone told me today that Christmas is 6 weeks away.... I had better get busy with my shopping!!