My getting lost buddy....

Im in Phoenix for a training, about words and I am learning so much and I love it, and Matt's at home with our ever so comfortable king size bed.

Can I just say that it's a lot better to be lost with someone than lost by yourself? When you're with someone else it's funny. When you're alone, it's stupid & more notable, embarrassing. I miss Matt. He's my "let's get lost and laugh" buddy. :(

Summary of the Months

So Aline borrowed my camera and then she broke it. So once she bought us a new one I haven't had any desire to post because I wanted a proof of our adventures. Anyways, I realized I haven't posted since Easter and we've done a lot! Some highlights are:

-Going to Arizona: Grand Canyon and camping!

-Going to Moab-We went down for Memorial Day

-Dying Easter Eggs with our cuter than a polar bear niece Ainsley

-Starting our garden and testing the soil (we discovered why Sandy is called "Sandy".)

-Celebrating my birthday- (Cirque du Solei & the Melting Pot)

-All of the interesting foods we've made. I tried to make a "Mormon" Tiramisu. Believe me, it looked a lot tastier than it was. It wasn't gross, it's just you expected more when you saw it. Matt also made this awesome stuff bread thing with peppers, egg plant, tomatoes.... so good! It looked so good!

Weather in Utah. Spring?

My Dad always says that if you don't like the weather in Utah, wait 10 mins and it will change.

Well... for the past 24 hours, I've been waiting for ten mins. Here are scenes from the kitchen windows.

Canyon Lands 1/2 Marathon!

Last Saturday we went down to Moab where Muriel and I ran the half marathon in Moab. It was so beautiful! It was also, so hard!

Our goal was to run without stopping and we made it! Muriel was really optimistic about the whole thing. Every time we stopped at a water station Muriel always said, "Thank you so much for your support!" Also periodically in the race Muriel and I would give each other high 5 and say, "Go us! We're doing it! Only 6 more miles to go!" Heh. Every now and again we would yell out, "Wahoo!" to give our own selves some support. It was great running it with Muriel. Her optimism provided me with more energy.

Along the run we ran into a man that had a 5o in 50 by 50 t-shirt. I asked him about it. He told me that he and his son's friends had a goal to run 50 half marathons in 50 states by the time they were 50. So hardcore! I wonder where they would run in Alaska? We also ran into a man wearing a disco suit. It wasn't polyester! It looked somewhat made out of breathable cotton but... it was interesting. I asked him if he felt any heat and he said no, I also asked if he trained in it, he also said no. He did tell me he was going to wear it out to dinner. I thought that was pretty hardcore. I dont know if I would run in something that wasn't your typical "exercising" outfit. Hm.

Also, near the end of the race---mile 11--- you come out of the canyon and run on the high way. That is usually where you start having more supporters on the road waving you on. Every time we saw a little kid sticking out his hand in the street for a high five Muriel would say, "Let's go give them high 5!" It's sweet, but after running 11 miles it seems the only thing you're thinking about is, "I must finish.... I must finish... keep running.... keep running...." Thinking about going out of your way, even if it is 3 or 4 inches to the side, just seems too much. However, Muriel was ever the optimist and I can also proudly say we did give high 5 to every little kid who had his hand sticking out. :)

It was a good run. Matt didn't run it with us but he met up with us at mile 12 and shouted, "Don't stop now!" I was thinking, "Oh... geez, easy for you to say!" It was nice however to have the support. :)

It was really, really, hard and I almost wanted to cry at the end because I was so tired---I think I'll do it again next year. If you want to do it.... let me know! We should run it together! It's triumphant!

This and That

Sometimes I get these moments where I think, "Ta dah! This is a moment that should be blogged." I'm not quite sure what the rules and regulations to blogging is and what would be considered worth reading but I've now found myself at my computer typing something up...

Today in primary a women told us that while she was living in New Orleans the LDS church their shared their chapel with Jews. Jews worship on Saturday so it was convenient for them to use it on Sunday. In any case a jewish couple walked in one Sunday morning because they missed their meeting on Saturday. They sat through the meetings and came into primary where they were singing, "Follow the Prophet". The jewish women loved the song and taught them a dance to go a long with it and today in primary we learned the simple version of the song. We danced jewish style in primary. We raised our hands, stepped from side to side, twisted, and shouted "HEY!". It was awesome.

Two weekends ago Matt and I went tubbing near Park City. EVERYONE MUST DO IT! Take Jeremy Ranch exit and turn left at the stop sign. Follow the road and you'll see it. It is so awesome! Tubbing was a fantastic experience. You choose a tube and they hook the tube up to this machine that takes you up the mountain. So it's more or less a free ride up. Look at the pictures... When they weren't taking you up and you had to walk to load the escalator like technique, Matt was sweet enough to pull me. :) We went with Salina and her friend Scott. We ran into this little kid who was probably 5 or 6. We were just playing around bumping out tubes into each other in a "mature" like way. Well this little kid that none of know ran and jumped on his tube purposely running into Salina. He laughed and smiled and ran ahead of us in line. He was super cute.

I also went to Moab a couple of weeks ago. Aline rubbed mud all over her face. I thought this video was so funny of Aline's explanation as to why she did it. I like to watch it when I'm not happy. It makes me laugh. Maybe because we're sisters and I get the inside joke? I dont know if anyone will think this is as funny as I do....

Kid Quotes

Sometimes I think I should have some type of quote book where I record all interesting things my students say. I think the quote of the week, this week, was when one boy turned to one girl and said:

"If you were the devil you would kill us."

I'm not sure where the conversation was coming from. It was just something I happened to pick up randomly.

My all time favorite quote was one teacher overheard one of my students say:

"Ms. Longstaff doesn't know it.... but we are going to lock her out of the room and have a party! We are going to listen to music with swear words in it!"

Old Habits Die Hard....

Cooking.

If you really know me that last word with a combination of the title of this post probably has caused you to smirk a little bit.

My room mates in college would make fun of me after I made something. I would always introduce any meal that I wanted to share with them, with the phrase, "Well it tastes good to me." My room mates realized that just because I thought it tasted good to me, wasn't a promise that it would taste good to anyone else.

I've had accidents in the kitchen where I am baking cookies and I want to run to the neighbors to do this "one quick thing"--- only to be gone for 30 mins and coming home to an apartment that smells like smoke, black hard cookies in the sink, and unhappy roommates. I'll never forget the time a similar episode happened but instead of cookies it was me frying fish on the stove in oil. I specify oil, so you can only guess what catastrophe follows. My dear roommate Emily was minding her own business, studying in the kitchen like any good college student would be doing. She smelt fire. When she turned around to investigate what smell this was she saw the little flame that my negligence had caused on the stove.

Cooking is not my forte. I am happy to say that since I've been married my skills have improved a little bit. Matt is a great example with his excellent cooking.

Well there is a point to this brief summary of my unfortunate cooking experiences.

Visiting Teaching.

Now for those of you unfamiliar with Visiting Teaching it's basically an opportunity to serve in the church. Visiting teaching allows sisters at church to get to know each other, to create a support network, and it's more or less an opportunity to have a best friend at church. I love visiting teaching because I know when done diligently it really produces friendships. However, I'll admit I feel it has it's awkward beginnings. One of my visiting teachers came over tonight for the first time.

In Brazil I loved the hospitality. Every time we went to visit someone they usually gave us some juice or a little piece of cake. I believe that food can bring people together! I wanted to make something for my visiting teacher so I could create a bit of a friendly environment. Who doesn't like to chat over tasty treats?

Because I really didn't have time to make bread I decided to go buy some orange roll mix. I love orange rolls! When I got home I immediately threw them in oven. I set the timer so it wouldn't be too late but the time I set wasn't enough so I set a new time and thought to myself, "Oh I better check back before it beeps." Well... I got involved with something else and I didn't check before he beeped. When I opened the oven the rolls looked a little crispy.

Why am I always prone to burning things?!?!?!

Anyways I had imagined them looking juicy and warm on my coffee table so I could offer them casually to my visiting teachers when they showed up, but I was embarrassed. The whole time she was talking to me I kept thinking of what I was going to do. Finally I decided that I wanted to give one to her because it was a friendly gesture.

I gave her one, but only first saying, "Im sorry it may be a little crispy but I really wanted to give you something." I'm not really sure why I said that. Maybe I wanted her to know that I knew why it didn't taste good. She smiled and said, "That's okay I like them crispy." I smiled really big and wanted to laugh wishing someone was there to witness this moment in my life!

She is suppose to say, "That's okay, I like them crispy." That's the NICE thing to say. I guess that's why Im writing in my Blog so someone else can be humored at this situation. This is just one more cooking experience gone wrong. Bleh.

Matt is off in India at some Salt Conference so I have no one to share the humoring, yet embarrassing moments, in my life at this moment. Yay for blogging!