Turkey and Baby

We're back at school after Thanksgiving break... but not really.  Now we just can't wait for Christmas!  This very minute David has a Christmas Pandora station playing in our little apartment.  We've also hung up our few Christmas decorations, and I plan on putting up the Christmas lights today!

Thanksgiving was wonderful!  We played lots of games, talked to family, baked, and saw movies in the theater.  We also had a baby shower! That was probably the most exciting part for me!  David was the best husband ever and helped a TON with the preparations, and even agreed to stick around for the party, since it was open house style and we weren't doing any goofy group games or a mass present opening.

The theme colors were red, pink, and white, with snowflakes and "It's a girl" decorations.  We had a big buffet of yummy food, and also collected a bunch of family baby pictures to hang int he living room for people to enjoy.  We also had two games available for guests to play, a "Guess the name of the Baby Animal" game, and a "Wishes for Baby" game.  "Wishes for Baby" was my favorite, because I got to read them all afterwards. It's a fill-in-the-blank type of game.  Some were really sweet, like the one David wrote, and some were very funny, like the one our friend Daniel wrote.  Here's Daniel's for your enjoyment:

Wishes for Baby
I hope that you... are awesome.
I hope you aren't afraid of... your dad.
I hope you love... uncle Daniel.
I hope you get... a brother.
I hope you laugh... at Westley.
I hope you never forget... how awesome your parents are.
I hope you ignore... stupid boys.
I hope you become... a mom.
I hope you respect... your parents.
I hope you [insert DON'T] grow... facial hair.
With love, Daniel Mason

Even more photos can be viewed on our Photo Stream (link found under the Photo Albums tag).

Colored

Last weekend we went to St. George to celebrate Grandma Joy's 80th birthday with the Parkinsons.  Well, the fun actually started when Julie came to stay with us the previous Sunday.  She was here in Provo to help McKay through hand surgery that he had on Monday, November 5th. So, our little apartment was full of Parkinsons all week long! It was fun.

On Friday we finally headed down to St. George to meet up with more Parkinsons! We drove more than half the way in a giant snowstorm.  Yikes! Luckily, we made it in one piece.  Saturday morning David and Shaun ran in a "Color Me Rad" 5K in St. George.  It was a cold, windy morning, and those poor boys only had on shorts and t-shirts.  They warmed up while they were running, though.  In short order, they were caked in colored chalk/powder, too.

It was pretty special surprising Joy for her birthday.  It was great to hang out with the grandparents/aunts/uncles/cousins.  We played games, talked, and ate lots of food!

While in St. George, we were able to retrieve the hardware to put together the crib we are borrowing from Scott and Julie.  Interestingly, once we got back to Provo, we realized we had no instructions for how to put the thing together. All we had were four sides, some springs, screws, pins, and long skinny poles.  Of course, David LOVED that fact.  It was like a big engineering puzzle for him.  Since I can't remember ever having a crib in my house growing up, and not really know how they work, I was all for googling SOMETHING to find directions.  But no, David wanted to figure it out by himself. And guess what?  He did, and it's awesome. The crib looks great :] Although we haven't had a baby (or even a mattress) in it yet, it appears to function properly, too.  We have already filled it with 2 boxes of stuff (story of our lives-- stuff, stuff, and more stuff!).

Now we get to look forward to Thanksgiving, which is less than a week away.  Yaaaaay!

Cheese Bread and Cheesiness

This weekend Clark and Joanna came to visit us on Friday night!  We ate lots and lots of pizza, cheesy bread, and dessert pizza.  It was so delicious, David and I felt like hibernating at the end of the night.  We also enjoyed a planetarium show at BYU, where we learned about creation and destruction of stars, and other wonders of the universe.  We also learned about constellations in the November sky.  After the presentation we got to look through some telescopes on the observation deck.  It was all very intriguing and inspiring.

Saturday we got to RELAX!! Oh my gosh, for once we had nothing set in stone for our Saturday.  Those are the best days, ever.  We went shopping together, did homework/study, and finished reading Cheaper By the Dozen together (one of my all time favorite books).

Today, we went to a stake conference for church, where we heard from Tad Callister, of the Presidency of the Quorum of the Seventy.  He is an excellent speaker, as is his wife.  Then we came home and David made Cheese Bread, or Pao de Queijo for a dinner get together that we are about to go to.  Pao de Queijo is a Brazilian food.  It's a ball of bread with a cheesy center-- so delicious!  I can't wait to scarf them down!