Past Events

Some amazing things have happened to us in the past couple weeks, or baggillion years as my family would exaggerate it to be.  Ok so my teeth are fixed, Mike is learning all the ins and outs of how to apply for medical schools, and he got the shift supervisor position he applied for at work!  I had my BYU orchestra concert, where we played everything from Pomp and Circumstance to Moldau to Dance Bacchanale (from Sampson and Delilah) which, if I say so myself, was pretty awesome.  For those of you who don’t know, I’ve been playing the violin for roughly ten years, so I’m kind of a big deal.  No, just kidding….but seriously.  No, it was fun though to be a part of such an amazing group of students who were all top notch back in their home high-schools.  Mike (who knows enough about music to think that when my bow is moving out of sync with the other performers it means that I’m working way harder than them) took me out to DQ afterwards as per my request to carry out the longstanding tradition of spoiling my family has upheld. 

We’ve also had a lot of free time to watch movies and hang out with our friends lately.  A few months ago (can it be so long?) we had some people over to decorate T-shirts, which was absolutely a blast!  We bought paint supplies at Hobby Lobby and prepared for a night of Youtube videos, homemade funnel cake, and general splendor.  I’m not going to say I love the people here in our ward, but I really love the people in our ward, and when they move away, we may just have to follow them in a creepy way. 

Here are some photos from this past school year so far:

Our Halloween Extravaganza and Haunted House (we really did go to a student-run $1 haunted house, although our apartment was pretty spooky too)

Paul Bunyon and Babe the Blue Ox

Mike and I as Clark Kent and Louis Lane (undercover superheroes)

Our good friends, the McQuays as Mario and Peach

More friends, the Pattersons as Peter Pan and Wendy

Trevor Blumel and Date as Rock Stars (I think Trev was Lady GaGa?)

The Hilarious Leavitts as a vampire and Red Riding Hood (with snacks!)

Then Christmas time snuck up on us.  I loved gettting to spend the holidays up at Mike's parent's house partly because Jane is such an AMAZING cook.  I gained a full two pounds over the holidays, and you can chart that!  Mike and I also got to be in charge of the family nativity this year, which was fun for all the nieces and nephews.  Overall, it was the best first-married-Christmas ever!

Before presents, Mike shows his guns in his old bedroom

Christmas morning

Santa got a little creative with my stocking this year because Mike and I didn't have time to buy our own real stockings.

Mike's stocking stuff was just laid out on the table

Mike bought me a Sonicare toothbrush!  Perfect after the whole bad teeth incident.  Ever since Christmas each morning he asks me "How do your teeth feel?  Do you like your new toothbrush?"  I think he covets it a little and maybe uses it when I'm not looking...

Leather-bound "the Messiah Series"

We got to drive out to Colorado after Christmas to visit my family and go snowshoeing with them, which was super fun.

Here's some pics of our T-shirt painting party

So all of my visiting teachers, teaching companions, one of the couples my husband home teaches, and a few more of our close friends are or have been pregnant recently, which is a plus!  Most of our other friends are getting engaged, heading on missions, or traveling out of the country for other reasons.  It’s fun to see such growth periods in the lives of those around us, and exciting to know that while we’ll all end up in different places, we can all share in experiences while we’re here at BYU. We’ve had some one-of–a-kind experiences from seeing the festival of colors, to scavenger hunt dates, to concerts, football and basketball games, and family game nights.  This past Saturday, we invited our friends, the Killins, to come donught dumpster diving with us.  

Around 10:00pm, we staked out the local Krispy Kreme with one thing on the brain…donughts.  When the coast was clear, we popped up into the trash and began our search.  Usually, they take the extra boxes of day-old donughts, place them gently in a trash bag, and stick them in the dumpster, but after having no luck finding these treasures, we were spotted!  Enrique (code name) the ‘Kreme employee found spotted us among our futile attempts to duck and weave ourselves into the camoflauge of donught crap and began laughing.  As we helped him heave his fresh load into the dumpster, we made friends and he generously offered us a bag of perhaps 100 untouched, slightly stale donughts, and we accepted.  To this day, we have a couple bowls of doughnuts left….Mission accomplished. 

In other news, my little brother was ordained an Aaronic priest, and my younger sister Paige recently lettered in Cheerleading back at Skyline.  So proud of them both!!!  They are really doing some amazing things while I’m in my dance classes learning about how to form my body into cooked and uncooked spaghetti noodles and performing to Haiku’s.  I really do love my modern dance class, though, and will be sad when it’s all over.

It's been fun!

Skillz

There are times in my life that feel like that "oh crap!" moment you have in a public restroom when your stall is out of toilet paper.  And then there are times like this week that feel, for lack of a better description, like you will make it.  Now it could be just the new year--a time when we promise ourselves we will never again eat that second piece of cake or think bad things about muffin-top girl--but I feel invigorated!  Perhaps that's because I think I've arrived at a new minor.....Visual Art!
Let me know what you think of some of my recent works

A Chilly Morning

Oh Provo...All this freezing weather makes me doodle and write poetry.  I actually love to write and believe it or not have a notebook full of doodles, song lyrics, and poetry.  I love seeing my younger siblings do the same; I really believe in creativity and developing your sense of self expression, and I've always kind of hoped to make something of my work as well.  Here's a more recent poem of mine...don't laugh!

The Fog:

A stone’s throw out on a distant shore

there lives a woman in the wake.

She beacons sinners through the fog

and quietly lurking, listening, waits.

Upon a hill, a lighthouse still

sits quietly; a salvation's’ light

bequeaths the sinners through the fog

to warm themselves and spend the night.

Yet though they see the light afar

the murky sea is tossed about,

and through the god-forsaken fog

their eyes alight, and they swim out.

Sweet whisperings upon the hail

and fog scented with enticing breath
makes many men wonder, weep, accept

and clasps them in an icy death. 

Eating Habits



My mom sent me this in a foreword and I found it very fitting.

This describes our Smiths' shopping experience every time.  We are the ones in the "10 items or less" line with a cart full of everything from potatoes to toilet paper, trying to pack everything onto the little scale before something topples off.  Until last week we didn't even know you could remove items from the scale before you paid...

Our first meal in Provo was a whole chicken in a crock pot with tons of onions, carrots, potatoes, and celery.  We just threw in a balsamic marinade and let it chill..er...heat, for about five hours and it was perfect!  I am so grateful to our friends and family, all of whom got us crock-pots as wedding gifts (just kidding...but we did end up with four total).  This means more good meals are in store for the future.

--Segue!--

 Speaking of good food....

When I'm not cooking, I'm eating...which means we have lots of time to invent new recipes and get creative with old ones we have.  It's amazing to think that before I was married, the extent of my cooking knowledge was how to heat Ramen Noodles and Hamburger Helper.  Since then one of our favorite activities has become cooking together, especially on Sunday nights.  We had a ward break-the-fast this past Sunday, so I whipped up an Italian dish that we could cook up at the Stake Center.  This Baked Spaghetti was partly my invention...so I'll take credit where it may or may not be due. 

Baked Spaghetti
2 lbs ground beef
1 24 oz can of tomato sauce

1 16 oz can diced tomatoes

1/2 a green bell pepper

1/2 onion

2 cloves minced garlic

about a package of Spaghetti noodles
1/4 cup bread crumbs
Salt and pepper
Garlic salt
Basil
Oregano
1 1/2 cups cheese (I used half cheddar, half a 4-cheese blend)

Directions:
Brown the ground beef on medium then drain excess fat.  Add the chopped onion, minced garlic, and bell pepper and cook, then add the tomatoes and sauce to warm.  Add spices like basil, garlic salt, oregano, pepper, and anything else that you can think of, then cover and simmer for at least 20 mins.  Meanwhile, boil the pasta until aldente, drain and put in a 9x13 pan.  Add half the cheese and then about 3/4 of the sauce.  Top with more cheese then the breadcrumbs then pop in the oven on 375 for about 35 minutes or until golden brown.  Vuala!  Italy in a pan.

We also made a homemade cranberry pie for just us



Sorry I'm on a food kick.  My AMAZING aunt Lisa and uncle Brian took us to dinner last night at Texas Roadhouse....and I will probably never be able to eat again!!  They were opening a new restaurant so the food was free (with a requested donation to a charity) and they constantly circulated hors d'oeuvres for each table to try.  As college students we indulged, and while most of us got stake and potatoes but were full by the time we actually got to the meal. It was such good food and great company.  Thank you guys!

Captain Crunch Robot-Man strikes again on our kitchen counter!  This is how we spend our study breaks

Learning to Dance in the Rain

It’s been a bit of a cold month… in more ways than one. 

Yesterday had a cold…it didn’t rain, but the sky leaked constantly from the time the sun was supposed to be up to when it came down at 4pm.  Today, the cold was discrete; instead of the sloshy wet cold, it hid in clear air and slowly became a part of every once-warm inch of my body.  It’s that biting cold that penetrates your skin and turns the air to tiny ice crystals that choke you and freeze your blood. 

I’m positive that we have this weather to discourage any thought of deferring studies to go outside during Midterm season.  Provo, you’ve done your job.  I have no intention of going outside ever again.  However, instead of focusing on Speech Anatomy, I can’t stop the onslaught of those kind of deep thoughts that come when gray clouds out the warmth in the world. 

Mike and I just watched a tragedy called “Coco Before Chanel," a movie that showed me how grateful I am that I don’t live in early 20^th century France and that I have the Gospel.  This movie portrays Coco Chanel (before her career as a major fashion designer) as an abrasive girl due to her abusive upbringing in an orphanage.  The few times she opens herself to opportunities to love, she is mistreated and finally claims she will never marry (she falls for a married man).  The movie ends quite suddenly just as she begins her career as a designer and after her lover dies.  I wouldn’t recommend this movie… it seemed to drag on and there was too much vulgarity in it, and the tragic ending had me reaching for my Gilmore Girls reruns.  I’m so grateful to know that my husband and I love each other completely, and to have complete trust in that love and fidelity in our marriage that seemed nonexistent, or at least widely unpopular, at that time.  It’s times like these where I’ve truly seen that pulling together isn’t looking into each other’s eyes, but standing next side by side and looking in the same direction.  Life gets hard, but it’s in learning to work through the trials together that we gain strength individually and as a family. 

Dear Mike:  PS, I love you.

We’ve had some tough things financially as of late (sorry! I’ll try to be more upbeat).  We found out that our car is utterly broken down; the engine gave out and a couple weeks ago.  So we turned this into a bonding opportunity…if any of you would like to strengthen your marriage, I’m teaching a workshop where we throw you in hot water and you must learn to swim, or at least tow a car together.  We woke up one frigid 6am to tow the car to the repair shop. Mike laid in the snow to hitch our Escort up to a friends’ PT Cruiser and, as our battery was dead as well, he turned on his hazard lights as we rolled down University Ave.  This was the first time I’ve 'driven' a dead car, and while I rode the break ok, the foggy window combined with the flashing lights ahead made it impossible to see Mike’s “stop” and “slow” arm signals from the window of the cruiser.  After what seemed to take hours (though I’m sure it was only minutes) we rolled into the parking lot just as the tow rope snapped off!  We needed about 100 feet more to get into a parking space so, undaunted, Mike picked up the rope.  I’ll never forget the image of him, soaked from lying in the snow, rope over shoulder, hauling me and our blessed little car 100 feet in the dark, illuminated only by the translucent HONK’S DOLLAR STORE sign.  He is my Superman. 

We are learning to live and love and get by.  A part of my tooth fell out as well recently, and though we don’t have dental insurance, I pray something will turn up.  We’ve already been blessed so much…the tow rope choosing to snap right when we pulled into a parking lot, not on the road; the money we always seem to have each month, from nowhere; the fact that I pray and find my phone immediately, or don’t end up lost on a snowy road; the times I need just one friend and a couple in our ward come to the rescue.  I know that My Heavenly Father watches out for each of us and I know that He truly sends others into our lives at the times we need Him most, and at the times where I feel like I may deserve it the least.  I am so grateful for His loving Arms, and it’s just as my Dad says…just take things “one day at a time.”

Amazing photo