Thankful

Tim and I weren't sure what we were going to do for Thanksgiving. We had thought about going away somewhere and eating China food and pretending like Thanksgiving didn't exist so that we wouldn't have to be sad about missing our family and not being with them. The girl that I carpool with (Tara) invited us to come to her house so we decided we would just to that instead. I am SO glad we did! We had such a good time. It was different (they had a table for all the alcohol) but a lot the same. The turkey was the best turkey I have ever tasted! It was SO moist! Everything was so yummy and everyone was so nice. Tim and I brought a veggie tray and a lemon pie...we made it from scratch and it was yu-my if I do say so myself! We had a bit of a fiasco with the pie, so I'm glad that it turned out good! We bought frozen pie crusts and didn't know that you had to cook the crust BEFORE you put the filling in! We put the pie in the oven and the meringue started getting BROWN! We pulled it out and the crust was still doughy! We called Tim's mom (about a gazillion times!) and we were going to try and just scrape the filling out, cook the crust, put the filling back in and redo the meringue, but the filling wouldn't come out all the way. So we had to make the whole thing again! Luckily we bought a two-pack of pie crusts!
What we thought was going to be our worst Thanksgiving ever (because we were going to have to be alone-not cause we were going to Tara's) turned out to be a grand adventure!
Here are a few things I am thankful for (in no particular order):
Tim-he is the perfect husband for me-he is my other half in someways and exactly like me in others and I wouldn't trade him for anyone or anything
My family(in it's entirety:)) -being SO far away makes you realize and be thankful for what you have
The restored gospel
My Savior
A loving Heavenly Father who sends tender mercies so I remember He is there
The opportunity to share my beliefs-being in a place where a lot of people have false beliefs about "Mormons" has really given me the opportunity to share my beliefs and to really reflect on what it is that I believe
A job-even though a lot of times I come home crying or frustrated or overwhelmed, I really am thankful to have a job
Good friends

She's MY mom

My mom was able to come and visit me a few days after Mand and Spence left. If there was ever a nomination for the "Best Mom in the World" award, MY mom would get it! She is THE most selfless person I know. This is the second time she has come and both times all she has done is helped me. No vacation, to fun sight-seeing. Just helped me. It was wonderful because I didn't feel stressed or like I had to entertain her or feel bad for asking her to do things because she is my mom and that is what she does. I know I can always count on her to be there for me when I need her. Here is a partial list of the things we did while she was here:
1.She helped me organize my classroom so I can be sane (I CANNOT function in unorganized madness!)
2.She helped me decorate my classroom door
3.She helped me pick out some good prizes for the "Treasure Box"
4.She helped me make a list of ways to earn "Behavior Bucks" and a list of fines
5.She made about a GAZILLION frozen dinners (which are DELICIOUS by the way!)so that I can just pop them in the oven or microwave when I get home and not have to try and come up with something for dinner or spend hours making it
6.She helped me write lesson plans
7.She did a thousand odd jobs in my classroom to make it look beautiful
8.She kept me company
9.She updated me on everything back in UT
10.She did everything I asked her to like I was this taskmaster and she was my servant
11.She chatted with Tim about his school and job and everything in between
12.She went grocery shopping with me
13.She sharpened pencils for me :)
14.She encouraged me and LIFTED me up
15.She gave me unconditional love, like always
I Love you Momma and I am so glad you are MY mom!
Thank you for EVERYTHING!

The OG's...almost

My mom calls her 4 original kids-Jare, me, Mand & Spence- her OG's. Well, Mand and Spence came to visit me...FOREVER ago... so all of the OG's were together again EXCEPT for Jare (we missed you and your cutie family)! I had a two week break from school (lovely year-round!!!) so Mand and Spence decided to come and see me and Virginia. It was SO nice to have a break and to have family come and keep me company. Mand wrote on her blog all about her and Spence's visit, so I will let you read all about it on her blog. The only thing she forgot to mention was our "Wrestle Mania" match where Helga the Horrible(aka Mand), Bertha the Big (aka me), duked it out with Spence...the little brother who is NO LONGER LITTLE!!! Well, when we were young we would lay a huge blanket down in our living room and play "Wrestle Mania". Two of us would stand in the corners and one person would be the referee.Some times we would make "diapers" out of whatever we found around the house and be sumo wrestlers, sometimes we would stuff our shirts with pillows and slam each other, but it was always called "Wrestle Mania" Anyway,it started out that Mand and Spence and I would usually gang up on Jare (well, I guess it was usually the other way around-he would gang up on us). Then eventually when Jare wasn't around Mand and I would gang up on Spence. And we would ALWAYS win. Well, not this time! Spence is HUGE and STRONG! Mand and I would go after Spence and he would make this crazy noise (I don't know how to describe it except that he was screaming "AHHHH" in a really deep voice)and he would flail his arms so he looked like a crazy ape ready to attack and Mand and I would burst into laughter and not be able to control ourselves. You know when you are laughing so hard all you can do is laugh and nothing else? That is what it was like! He would make that voice and it would paralyze us! So we would be standing there paralyzed and Spence would zap us both to the ground single handedly. I'm telling you he is crazy that Spence. Poor Tim didn't know what to do with himself! He hid upstairs trying to stay out of our way lest Spence should paralyze him, too! It probably didn't help that Mand and I...excuse me, I mean, Helga and Bertha were trying to make the same noise so we could paralyze Spence so all Tim could hear was crazy screaming, then laughter then little girlie screams from Mand and I. I will have you know that Mand and I DID slam Spence to the ground...okay, we got him to the ground TWICE and were quite proud of ourselves! Aww, the good ole days! It was SOOOOOOOO fun to have Mand and Spence come. I cried when they left. Thanks so much for coming! I love you both and wouldn't trade you for anything!
Ps. Thanks Koby for sharing your wife so she could come and see me!:)

Utah vs. Virginia

We noticed quite a few differences in UT and VA right off the bat! Here are a few:
Gas prices are lower in VA!



A gallon of gas ($2.75 at the moment!!!) is WAAAAY cheaper than a gallon of milk ($3.99)...I'm pretty sure it was around $3.35 in UT when we left!



The freeways are lined with trees in VA (we didn't even know we had a target right around the corner because of all the trees in the way!)



There are RACKS and RACKS and RACKS of wine in the grocery stores in VA (I never saw anything like it in UT!)




1 out of every 5 cars have some sort of saying for their license plate in VA (I bet it is like 1 in 50 in UT)...I swear, they are taking over the world...or at least the road!



They have NO good bread in VA! Tim and I are breadaholics so this will mean nothing to you if you are a wonderbread fan, but we like thick tasty bread like Grandma Sycamore's and have tried EVERY kind of bread from all the grocery stores (which we had to hunt for behind all the trees:)) and have found very few that satisfy our taste and they are from the bakery and go rotten in like 2 days! :(

We're Here!

Both in the blogging world and in Virginia! I guess we've been in VA for a while now, but now that I have time (and a blog...thanks Mand!) I can tell everyone about it! When we first arrived we had a BUNCH to do! I had a phone interview before we left and found out I got a teaching job at a year-round school that was already in session. We sold both of our cars so we had to find a car here and since my job started the following Monday, we needed one PRONTO! Tim's parents and my mom came with us to help us move in, so we wanted to use our resources wisely! Tim's parents came ahead with Tim and cleaned up our new apartment, found a bank for us, started the car hunt, unloaded the moving trailer, and helped put away our stuff (THANK YOU MOM AND DAD B!!!). My mom kept me company on the plane, helped clean, unloaded the moving trailer, helped find a good place for our stuff, and was a joy to have around (THANKS MOM!!!). We had to go through a bunch of changes all at once so it was good to have some familiar faces to keep us sane! We still think of Utah as home, but we are growing to love VA.



Here's some pictures of our room-it's my favorite room in our apartment!

Virginia has some pretty sunsets!