The Sensational Six Meet Again

We got together with the sensational six plus three (sorry...no explanation on that) this past weekend and it was a ton of fun!

We had dinner at Ry's parents house and then played water balloon volleyball. I experinced a balloon to the head, and one to the backside, but overall made it out alright. It was a great evening. Oh! We also found out this weekend that we are soon to be plus 4, because James and Allison are engaged! Nikki is pregnant, but I don't know what that adds to our group (additional 1...? I don't know!). Congratulations to Nikki, James, and Allison!

Long Beach

Last week I went to Long Beach for an entire week for work. I went there to get some additional training and do a little bit of training for other people too. It was kind of a lonely week...

I stayed at an Extended Stay Hotel, meaning that there is no food/restaurant there, no pool, etc etc. Also, I didn't have a car and I didn't know anybody there, so I was pretty much on my own.

The first day I bummed a ride to the grocery store and got a few things to keep in my kitchenette for the week. I went home every afternoon around 4:30, and pretty much just....ummm...hung out. There was nothing to do. It was relaxing in one way, and boring in another.

When one of the supervisors in the office asked about my stay, I mentioned that I really hadn't done anything. She was shocked and decided to take me out for a nice steak dinner and down to the beach.

The next day, she and her team took me to this awesome restaurant on the harbor and I had crab, shrimp, lobster linguini, which was amazing! When you leave, they wrap you left overs in a foil swan. Unfortunately I couldn't take that on the plane:( All in all in ended up being a great week, but I am glad to be back home!

My Oh-So Fashionable Husband

The other day we were down at Matt's parents' home. Matt's mom mentioned that she had some of his Dad's old clothes for Matt to try on and see if he wanted them. The result was that I ended up in giggles so severe that I cried and had to leave the room. I'm not sure if Matt's dad appreciates the teasing, but he is a good natured guy with a good sense of humor, so I thought I would go ahead and post these gems.

Now this picture is another story.....

Growing up, my brothers and sister and I would always tease my Dad because he would come home from work or church and would put on sweat pants or scrubs, and would tuck his white shirt into them and top it off with a sweater and slippers...I'm not lying. Like Matt's dad, it is a good thing my dad has a good sense of humor.

After we left Matt's parents, we went down to my parents' house. Matt had a little hole in his pants that my Mom offered to sew, but he had to wear some of my Dad's pj's while he waited. This was the final product, and yes, I will be saving these to show our kids in the future.

Race for Brittany

The 12th ward runners!

My Mother in Law, Nancy, and me.

There is a sweet and wonderful girl in my ward that I am good friends with. Her name is Brittany and she was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. I have never been very close to anybody with breast cancer, so this really hit me hard. This year in honor of Brittany I, along with some other people in our ward, ran the race for the cure. I am not a runner, but I have to say I never found running to be so easy and fun. I guess it was because I had a real purpose for running.

It was great to see people rally around Brittany. She is such an amazing person, and her attitude and testimony through all of this has been truly amazing to me. She is a wonderful example to me and everybody else around her.

Brittany wasn't able to join us at the race because she was in the hospital due to a few complications. We went to visit her there after.

REAL!

Justin and Megan got some tickets for the Real Soccer Game on May 3rd and it was so much fun. David Beckham was there and we watched as he threw his jersey to a crazed teeny bopper...it was pretty fun.
Molly seemed to have quite the thing for Matt that night and wouldn't sit with anybody but him. Secretly, I'm pretty sure he didn't mind:) Here are a few highlights.

TAG

I have been tagged several times in the last few weeks, and like I said before...I've been a little bit busy. Here goes!

3 joys: Riding in a car at night with quiet music playing, or even better...no music, with rain.

3 fears: Spiders, Being startled, a Family member's death.

3 goals: Start writing in my journal again, Cook more often, Exercise more.

3 current obsessions: Greek salad with yummy lemon dressing, checking my email, reading blogs

3 random/surprising facts: I sneeze an average of 7-10 times every single day, I was invited to my junior high track meet for the high jump, I cry about almost everything...the tv show Reba, spiders, hallmark commercials...everything.

I now tag Tanya Mae, Cynthia, and Megan

Spring Time is Finally Here....I think.

In the excitement of having a warm day (finally) Matt and I took our dinner down to temple square and ate outside in the sunshine and then took some pictures of the beautiful flowers and the temple. It was so nice to finally get outside for a change.



Isn't this picture awesome? Matt took this. He has quite the talent if I do say so myself!

A Weekend of Rest and Relaxation???

Thanks to our wonderful friends, the Youngs, for inviting us to take a weekend off at their cabin in the canyon. When Jen asked us about going, she said there would be a lot of snow. We packed for that, but as we started up the canyon, we weren't sure if she was crazy or not because there really wasn't a lot of snow. As we continued to get higher and higher, we finally understood what she meant...there was tons!!

Her husband thought we might as well try taking the minivan up the icy road to the cabin with all of us and our stuff inside. It only took about 10 feet to realize that was a bad decision. We got totally stuck. Matt and Aaron were kind enough to get out and dig us out so we could back down the mountain. Matt pushed so hard that he literally made himself sick and about passed out! We decided the only way we were getting up there was if we packed up all of our gear and went on foot. It was quite the feat. Jen had a novel idea for the two of us to go back to the van with a tarp and put everything on there and pull it up to the cabin. We made it about 20 feet before Aaron came and rescued us...it was sooooo heavy!

We did eventually get settled in for the night with a nice fire, a good dinner and some good chatting time. Here are their 2 cute snow bunny kids....aren't they adorable?





Just before bed Matt and I took a flash light and headed out to the out house. Because of the amount of snow, Aaron and Matt had to dig out the out house, and it was a pretty steep step to get down to it. As I was coming out, I wasn't being too bright, and I stepped up sharply, jabbing the edge of the roof into my head, which made a lovely puncture wound. Jen is a nurse and she looked at it and said it probably could have used a couple of stitches, but it wasn't a big deal. She put some hydrogen pyroxide (ouch!) on it and I went to bed with a throbbing headache. Here is a picture of my gross puncture wound. Sorry if you don't think its very cool, but by golly, this is my blog and I'll post whatever I want!
The next morning Jen and I made a delicious breakfast of eggs, bacon, hash brown, and pancakes. Yum!
We spent the rest of the day out in the snow just in front of the cabin. Matt got straight to work making some fun sledding paths for us, and we flew down them on a piece of plastic Aaron found in the cabin. Emma, Jen, and Aaron built a snowman, and I did a little bit of everything. We had so much fun.
We finished off the day with a delicious dinner, some games, and part of a movie, before we were all too tired from the day and decided to head home. Thanks to the Youngs for a great weekend!

Conference Weekend

Conference weekend is always a lot of fun for our family. We almost always get together to watch the Sunday sessions, and have a great dinner and lots of fun together.

This year while all the men went to Priesthood, me, my Mom, and Megan went out to eat (I can't remember where we went!). While I was there I saw both Julie and Lindsey and got to chat with them for a little while. After that we went to Tai Pan Trading Company and I bought a few spring decorations for our little apartment.

When Priesthood was over we met all the guys for some Italian Ice Cream (again...can't remember the place, and the name of the ice cream is escaping me). Anyway, it was a lot of fun.


These are a few pictures of our great weekend. Molly is being tickled by her parents and we were all getting a kick out of her giggles.

Apparently Tiana wants to be a photographer when she grows up. She borrowed our camera and went throughout the house taking pictures of everybody and saying, "good one guys" or "oops, that one is weird. Smile again!" She was pretty cute. This is one of her masterpieces.

After the first session we played a family game of kickball. Tiana didn't quite understand the game, so it was more a game of "Tiana run in a big circle and everybody else pretend to try and get her out". We had a good time!

Matt and His "Shadow"

Well...it seems that I have been on a blogging vacation. I won't go into too much detail, but things at my job have been absolutely insane. I got a promotion (yahoo!!) but it is now requiring a ton more work. I am still working on finding a balance between work and everything else.

This is a picture of Matt and his dog, Shadow. Matt was about 12 years old when he found this scruffy dog at a gas station in South Carolina. Matt instantly was drawn to her, so he "coaxed", well basically dragged her home with him, although he told his parents that she followed him home! They ended up keeping her for the next 12 years and she became part of the family. She was always considered Matt's dog, and he has always just loved her. We have made a number of trips to Sandy just because he needed to see his dog.

Recently Shadow became really sick. We thought she may have had a stroke, or something similar to that. She had a hard time walking, eating, drinking, and even sleeping. Finally, Matt's parents made the decision to put her down. I was lucky enough to be able to be there when this took place, with the rest of the family. Maybe it sounds odd to say "lucky", but that is how I felt. I never realized that an animal really could become such an important member of the family, and it was really difficult to watch this sweet old dog go. The night before we took her to the vet, Matt and his brother Jameson spent part of the evening laying on the bathroom floor where Shadow's bed was kept. Shadow really was a sweet and loving dog. She is definitely missed by the Tanner family. We love you Shadow!