Date Night at the Thorns

Wow! Brother and Sister Thorn are the coolest people ever! They also have a SUPER fun house complete with great views, great artwork, great architecture AND a great indoor racquetball court.
Brooke and Liz bought this fun night-with-the-Thorns at our Ward service auction a few weeks ago, and Brook asked me to come with her.

Don't worry we leg wrestled and I definitely won. Hahaha!

Despite Brook trying to intimidate me.

Liz Brought Sam.

Nice Sam. Nice!

And Kaitlyn (sp??) brought Jonathon.

I wish I would've taken more pictures. Sister Thorn made a yummy dinner for us, then we headed over to the racquetball court and played 5 or 6 games of Volleyball. Then it was back inside for a game of pool.

Poor Brother Thorn.

He tried so hard to set Sister Thorn up perfectly for this behind the back shot...but something went wrong and the cue ball only went a few inches.
We all had a good laugh over that one.

We ended the night with homemade pie and card games. So fun! Even though I lost horribly. Oh well. I think I'm definitely going to invite myself over again sometime. Everyone had a great time!

New Calling

So what's your record of how many callings you've held in one month??? In the last 30 days of my life I've had THREE!! I went from being a member of the Spiritual and Temporal Welfare Committee (Try saying that three times fast!) to being the Ward Financial Clerk to being THE Ward Clerk (who is over the financial and membership..... and one more clerk that I can't remember right now....) Yikes! Not sure why they felt like they had to make all these crazy changes right when tons of reports and whatnot are due. I'm totally lost with all of it. All I can do is my best and when something slips through the cracks I just shrug my shoulders and say, "It's not my fault! I have no idea what I'm doing!" Hahaha. Here's to the next few months of me learning how the church functions. Wish me luck!

Mountain biking in St. George

Gotta love that red rock!

So I went Mountain Biking in St. George last Saturday. We must be crazy! We got up and left by 6:30 AM drove down, rode two trails and then headed for home. Hahaha! I was a little worried on the drive down because my little temperature gauge wasn't going a blip over 19 degrees. That's COLD! It remained that cold right up until we started biking. Which was probably around 10:30 or 11. But then the sun broke through the clouds and it turned into a gorgeous day! We couldn't have asked for a better day! We had a much smaller group this year compared to last year. Sometimes I feel like smaller groups are better when mountain biking. The more people you have the wider they vary in skill level and the more likely you are to have problems with bikes. There were just 5 of us this time. The guy who rode in my car pretty much slept the whole way there and the whole way back. We did Gooseberry Mesa again. There are actually a lot of trails all over it, we did the South Rim. Super pretty!

This is the group. Left to Right: Koda, me, Kate, Liz and Ian

By the time we finished that we barely had enough time to do the other trail. In hindsight we probably shouldn't have done it. However I'm glad we did! It's called the JEM trail - after the initials of the three guys who have blazed and maintained most of the biking trails in the area. Props to them! It was SUPER FUN! Ian and I shuttled the cars down to the bottom while Koda, Kate and Liz started down the trail. By the time Ian and I got back to the top the sun was down, it was getting dark and it was COLD! So, naturally, off we went! The first 1/2 mile of the trail was pretty much going down the face of a cliff, but after that it was relatively flat with small rises and dips here and there. We were FLYING! It was a super fun trail! And once we got going it wasn't all that cold. Lucky for us the dirt on the trail was a little lighter than the surrounding dirt so we were able to see where we were going fairly well. We caught up to the other three just 100 feet before the end of the trail. By then it was pretty much pitch black and they were walking thier bikes. I'd like to go back and do that one a few more times in the daylight. We had to slow down quite a bit once it really got dark.
The drive home was uneventful. We drove through 3 separate snow storms though! I thought they were SO beautiful but Koda was sure we were going to die. Hahaha! He was kind of a weirdy. ;-) One of the storms we drove through was incredible. The snow was so fine it literally looked like we were driving through glitter. Everything was sparkling! Too bad my camera was in the trunk. I totally would've taken a few pictures of it.
It was a fun trip - and probably the last mountain biking I'll do until spring. Bummer. But at least it's finally starting to look like winter around here! BRING ON THE SKI SEASON!

Shoot!

It's been a month and I haven't posted anything! I shouldn't let that happen.
It's been a fun month though....

Thanksgiving was.....nice. Hahaha.
The drive up was an adventure. Poor Jason threw up - what? Seven times? Maybe even more??? The poor guy! I'm sure he just thought he was dying. His little whimper was just so pitiful. My heart hurt a little bit for him. Brit, Brent and I had a pretty good system going by the end of the drive though. We got pretty good at catching him before he managed to vomit all over the world. Hahaha! I'm chuckling now just thinking about it. Brittany thinks it was food poisoning or something. Who knows. At least he didn't pass it on to the rest of us! He was great for the rest of the week AND for the drive home. Except for the part when he fell down the last few steps while going down the stairs. Don't worry, it was only like 3 or 4 steps. It scared him more than hurt him. He actually picked up on how to navigate the stairs pretty quick! Smart little guy!
As for the rest of the week....I wish I could say I enjoyed it more but I spent THE ENTIRE TIME down in the basement buried in my Organic Chemistry book and notes. That class is going to be the death of me. Despite studying ALL break long I still did horrible on my test. :-( So stinking frustrating. I feel like I just managed to study all the wrong things. However, the final is coming up and I think (hope) that is going to be my redemption. I feel like I've really internalized everything. We'll see how it goes. It's not until Thursday.
Thanksgiving dinner was great! I really love how Deb organizes and plans everything. There was just enough food - which I've decided is perfect. That way, you eat and are satisfied and then the food is gone instead of being there all afternoon long just waiting for you to eat more and more and more and more.... Enough said.
I was pretty sad we didn't get to go up and cut down a Christmas Tree together this year. That is one of my very favorite traditions and I don't want to let it go! I guess they went up and got one after Brittany, Brent and I left for Provo. Oh well.... sort of.


BYU won the game vs. Utah! Hooray! That totally made the drive home a day early worth it. I had never been to the BYU vs. Utah game - and this is most likely my last chance because next year it'll be in Salt Lake and then I graduate! I'm glad I went to it and I'm even more glad I we won! On the way in to Provo we stopped in West Point to pick up my friend Liz. I ended up going to the game with her because no one from my group was going to be there. It was fun! She has non-rotating seats. Meaning they've been at the same spot all season long. They've become acquainted with the people that sit around them and it really made for a fun time.
When Liz and I headed off on our bikes to the game it was a pleasant 50 degrees outside so we were just wearing pullover hoodies. BIG MISTAKE! That sun went down and it got COLD! And then we had to ride our bikes home! My hands were red and swollen and aching by the time we got home. Hahaha. Oh well. It was a fun game anyway!