I know it's silly but...

...this view just makes me smile....We finally have matching dishes! It makes me smile everyday when I open the cupboard. :)

And just yesterday we got all the new glasses and silverware unpacked, washed and into the cupboard and drawer.... Hooray!! It's silly but its just so wonderful to have everything match! I love it!

Anyway... we are all doing good and the girls seem to be adjusting to well to the new house. They (and Troy) are mad at me because I won't let them sit on the couch or sleep on the bed, but we'll get through it. :) They love the giant beanbag... which I expected, because Askie loves it too.

Winter has arrived!

I think its been below freezing for 3 or 4 days now... haha! And the snow has arrived in piles! It looks really pretty as long as you are inside a warm house and not trying to drive in it. :) Actually... its not so bad...

These pictures are from the last storm a few days ago... much more snow now, but you get the general idea...

Tomorrow we start all our Christmas festivities!! We are going to the Nutcracker Ballet tomorrow evening and then to the Christmas Spirituals (Symphony) concert on Saturday! I have never seen the Nutcracker so I am very excited for that! Also, the Christmas Spirituals concert is supposed to be really cool - I have been looking forward to it for weeks!

Hopefully somewhere in there we can squeeze in the ZOO LIGHTS! We were going to go tonight, but Troy's last paper was more important.... maybe Saturday evening before the Symphony...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Today I woke up to this....

Winter has arrived with a vengeance. Troy even wore a coat today... and we all know how rare that is! Haha! As for me... I am enjoying the boot weather and using it as an excuse to get out the Christmas music early! :)
Rumor has it that it will be sunny again by tomorrow... hahaa.... love that Utah weather....

Congratulations to Barrack Obama - the next President of the United States of America. Whether you are a fan of Obama or not, I think its important for each of us to take a moment and think about this historic day... Yesterday, for the first time in the history of our nation we have elected an African American man as our next President. I am proud of our nation for overcoming the prejudices of our past. This truly is the land of opportunity! ok... enough with the politics.... hahaa....

P.S. Thank you, Elliott, for the wonderful Halloween card! I LOVED it!

in the garden...

I tackled sprucing up the garden this weekend. Last year I thought I was planting items that would come back this year and I wouldn't need to redo the flower beds at all... however... only a couple of the new plants came back. Not sure if I had bugs or what... or perhaps there was just too much snow. Haha!

Anyway... Askie and I spent some time putting in some new plants... some Coral Bells, Lavender, Sage and one thats a little more tropical looking that I can't recall the name of. Supposedly its great in direct sunlit, so I hope it does well this summer and lasts through the winter to return next year.

Here are a few photos...And here is what Askie did while I was slaving away... As the sun came up higher, he kept creeping over closer and closer to the neighbors car. Soon he was in the dirt between bushes. Silly puppy.
Then he just wanted to go to the balcony where he knew there was shade. Haha! Can't say I blame him... its been very hot out.

Birthday Part 4…

Yeah… Shelly pointed out that Saturday was actually my 4^th celebration since I had the Hickman Family dinner last week, my play day Tuesday, lunch with a girlfriend (Thanks Erica!) on Friday, and then my hot date on Saturday! Still, the celebration was shorter than my usual month… haha!

So anyway, the Birthday Celebration, Part 4, was great fun! We went out to dinner at a cute little café called the TIN ANGEL and it was YUMMY! For my birthday present Troy gave me the season tickets for Desert Star Playhouse that I have been wanting… I can’t wait to go to the next play!! I love my present… gracias, mi amorcito!

After dinner we headed over to Ballet West’s “Nine Sinatra Songs” (Annual show that they used to call “Evening of Ballets” where they do a variety of pieces from different shows, variety of music, etc.) It was soooo great! We both loved the show and have been telling all our local friends and family to go see it before it closes this next weekend. Troy’s favorite piece was “Hamlet and Ophelia”, which I also loved. My favorite was the “Nine Sinatra Songs”, mostly because I am a sucker for Frank Sinatra, but the dancing was great too! It was interesting to see ball-room style dancing mixed with some contemporary ballet… at least that’s how I would describe it. It was very fun!

After the Ballet was the Studio-D After-Party at Café Molise. We mostly hung out with Mark (one of my grad school buddies) and Liberty (one of the Ririe-Woodbury Alumni Dancers) and had a wonderful time! They are both so fun, and we love hanging out with them! It was great to see all our other friends too!!

Mark has also been bugging us at every chance to put our wedding date “in pen” so that he can make sure he isn’t out of the country… Haha… I know, I know - it’s a familiar topic with both sides of the family as well! Haha! So, no this is not an official announcement but - we are working on getting all the paperwork done that we need for the temple sealing, and are still hoping to have it all done in time for us to have a fall wedding… So, keep your fingers crossed for us that the timing will work out!

Of course, the Stake President said that a wedding in Italy sounds more fun to him, and since he plans to come, he may purposely hold up the papers… Haha! Troy has been friends with him for many, many years, and he is a really great guy. And of course I really like him too because he always tells Troy what a great girl I am! :)

Anyway… yesterday afternoon we headed off to Troy’s Great-Uncle Victor’s Birthday Party. It was nice to meet a few of Colleen’s extended family members that I hadn’t met yet, and to see the others all again. And, despite the cold windy weather at the park, it was fun to help Victor usher in his 87^th year!

As for the car…. I caved in and got it fixed. Troy and I are both hoping that the car will make it until the end of the year without having any more expensive repairs. By that time, Troy will be done with school, and we will hopefully have a better idea of whether we are staying in Salt Lake for awhile longer, or if we are moving to a new city... So, hopefully the car will cooperate with our plan!!

Here’s a few photos from Saturday…

I have decided that this style of dress is not very flattering on me.... but its so comfy that I just can't resist! And besides... this one matches my green shoes sooo perfect! haha!

P.S. I mentioned our new photo wall a few weeks ago... here is what it looks like so far. It's a little lopsided at the moment, but we are doing a photo shoot with Maika and Aleusha soon, and hope to get some good shots to add to the wall from that. :)

flowers everywhere...

We had so many gorgeous flowers at the Cabaret… We decided to take a few bunches home. The flowers were all these gorgeous red (with little hints of orange) and white colors… my arrangements of course don’t do them justice!

Calla Lilies of course…

And I don’t normally like daisies but the color of these is just so beautiful! I love them!

And here are a few bunches more…

Troy and I are also working on a picture wall so that we can show off our newest family photos with Askie (and we will hopefully have some with the girls soon too!). Here are a few preview shots of some of the frames and photos. Can’t wait until its all up!

Parade of Homes...

What a fun weekend! We spent most of the weekend at the Parade of Homes... getting ideas for future houses, dreaming about houses we can't afford, etc, etc. Haha! I think my favorite idea though is the pantry pass-through door from the garage... very good idea!

Anyway, we met a home designer who we really liked and we loved his ideas! So if we ever get around to building a house, we will definitely be calling him! He even loved our idea of a dog run that has a door into a room just for the dogs... haha!

I am a little behind on our events for the last couple weeks so here is a quick run down....

- We finally had our first group dinner date with all of our newly married friends. Its nearly impossible to find a night that works for everyone but we finally found one that worked for the majority at least. Haha! So we headed out to dinner with 3 other couples and had a wonderful time just chatting and hanging out! Otter and Kim, as well as Michelle and James, got married in June and we hadn't seen any of them since their weddings, so that was extra fun. Shelly (the one who used to live with me) got married in May and she and her husband Dave came to join us for dinner too. These two photos are of Kim and I, and Otter and Troy. I look so tall in that photo of Kim and I... cracks me up! She and I are actually about the same height, she just was in flip flops and I was in tall wedges... haha! And as you can see from the huge water spots on Troy's shirt... haha... we obviously got caught in a bit of a downpour!

- We finally saw Transformers! Loved it! Both of us just thoroughly enjoyed the movie and it totally took me back to my youth. Haha! Anyway, I know its gotten mixed reviews but we loved it!

- We took a trip to the driving range a week or so ago... time for another one soon! I finished my golf lessons and am seeing some improvement. I am still hitting to the right but its slowly getting better. Hopefully I won't get too frustrated and quit before I get it fixed. Haha!

- I sparred last week for the first time since my foot surgery! I actually don't enjoy sparring that much, but it was fun to get back into it after being away for so long. My teacher wouldn't let me kick but my opponent and I worked on hand techniques, which was good practice for me anyway. I was teamed up with a blue belt who is just learning to fight so it was fun for me to be in a teaching position. I miss teaching... just don't know if I have the time to do it on a regular basis (and we all know I am way too out of shape!)

I think that's about it! :) Oh wait... I finally got the new mattress!! Yeah!!! Now I have two guest beds so bring on the visitors!

This coming weekend is the Dash for Donation.... 5K fundraising event for the Organ, Eye and Tissue Donation Awareness Campaign. I have volunteered at the event in past years, but I think this year we will participate instead. It's at Sugarhouse Park on Saturday morning. We'll be there bright and early! Well early none-the-less. Haha!

Fun summer weekend...

This past weekend it was HOT! But despite that, we had a lovely time! Well... after all the hard labor in the various yards... haha! Troy spent a good portion of Saturday helping his brother build a retaining wall. Hard work, even when its not 100 degrees out. But he was happy to help and said that it looked very good when all done.

Since he was occupied, I spent the day working on my own yard. The community takes care of the yard, but when they put all the landscaping in, they did the bare minimum. There were only a few plants in my garden and none of them especially pretty. So... I filled it in a bit. I attached a picture, but I'm sure its hard to really see the difference. Haha! But... I can see it and it makes me smile. Once the new plants grow in a bit, it will look great! I hope!

The rest of the weekend was a little more leisurely... happily! We headed up to Park City - to a little cooler weather which was a very welcome change! Did a little shopping and walked around the galleries, etc.

After Park City, we went for a nice drive down Immigration Canyon. I always love it there! We looked at a gorgeous piece of property that we can't afford, but loved to see anyway. It has gorgeous view up and down the canyon and was a great layout for the style of house that we would someday like to build. Its fun to dream! :)

And then it was off to the Jazz Festival! :) I always love the Jazz festival. We didn't end up staying very long but we enjoyed the music of a lovely little jazz quartet while we were there.

I love the weekends! :)

Happy 4th of July!!!

Today I am thankful for...

FREEDOM! :) Troy and I had such a wonderful 4th of July and it just made me so thankful for the freedoms that we have. We went up to Deer Valley to hear the Utah Symphony perform, and to have a little picnic. For anyone who hasn't been up there, they do lots of concerts up there during the summer. There is an outdoor amphitheater and you take blanks and/or beach chairs and sit on the ski slopes and have a picnic. Its very fun!

Anyway... At the beginning of the concert they had the Color Guard from the Air Force bring out the flag so that the symphony could play the National Anthem, while several people sang along. And right when the song was starting, an Apache helicopter flew right over the stage and then over the crowd. It was very cool. I just wish I had my camera out! Haha!

The concert was wonderful with lots of fun songs... a patriotic theme mostly (aside from the random selection from Star Wars. Haha!). Then towards the end they did an arrangement of songs from all the different Armed Forces... and all the people in the crowd who had served in each of the Armed Forces, and their families, stood up. It was very moving and a wonderful experience. There were people there from the Army, Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard, Marines, and I think the National Guard too. It was a great experience. After that we headed down the canyon while watching the fireworks in Park City. Then when we hit the valley we got to watch the fireworks all the way home... they were going off at locations all over the whole valley. Very pretty! :)

Ok... now to back track a little.... Tuesday night we splurged and we to the dollar theater.. Haha! We went to see HOG WILD! What a fun movie! For anyone who has ever wanted a Harley, or some other type of cruiser, it is just a very entertaining movie! We laughed sooo hard and just loved it! However, it made us both want motorcycles again! We thought we had talked ourselves out of them.... we'll have to work on that again now. Haha!

And before heading up to Deer Valley on Wednesday we stopped in Park City, and stumbled upon a really cool art gallery on Main Street. They had a special exhibit going with some Picasso, Monet, Manet, Chigal and Rembrandt pieces. Several were lithographs, but some were original etchings, etc. It was very cool and we were happy that we had found it. What a pleasant surprise it was!

So who all is coming up later this month for the reunion, etc.???? I have plenty of room for all! :) By then I will hopefully have two guest rooms (both with beds. Haha!), and a freshly painted basement! The basement may still need new carpet at that point, but I hope to have the paint done by then. I have a friend who is here on a student visa... he also happens to be a widower trying to raise 4 children. He isn't allowed to seek employment but has offered 'handyman services' for very cheap prices.... so, I figure I can get some work done and give him some much needed help in the process. :) And it saves me having to do the painting myself! Haha!

The Shelves are in, and I LOVE them!

The shelves that have been patiently awaiting installation are finally in! And I could not be happier with them! I walked down the stairs after they were all installed and filled, and I was just beaming from ear to ear. :) I love being surrounded by pictures of family and friends!
Thank you, Troy for doing such an excellent installation! :)