Catch-up post #2

We had a fun open house for Dallin who recently left for his mission in South America. We made tons of good food and a nice crowd showed up to wish an exceptional young man well as he ventures off on this exciting new adventure.  As I mentioned before, I adore this boy (and his entire family) and I'm so proud of him.  

After the open house, I was fortunate enough to be invited to attend his setting apart.  Here's a pic of all of us after Dallin's blessing.  His grandma, seated below, was my "mom" at my first ever youth conference - one of those scary wilderness ones.  I've loved her since I was 14 and it's so great that I've been able to become close to her children and grandchildren too.

I love this family!

Greg, Dallin, Aaron (nice blond hair, no?) and Sterling

Including so you can see my crying eyes AND messed up hair. LOL. But look at Dallin's face - pure joy!

Fun with the Connell's & the swim team

I was a complete idiot yesterday and totally forgot to go to another ward to hear one of my most favorite young men in the world speak before he leaves for his mission next week.  FYI, I rarely forget important things.  I just don't.  I remember the most ridiculous, trivial minutiae and I forget to go listen to Dallin speak before he leaves for South America for two whole years?  The fact that I forgot something so major just kills me.  Seriously.  I'm still dying about it.

This is Dallin - he is amazing.  And forgiving. I taught him Primary the year he got baptized so we go way back.  And my hair is long - wow.

So when I wrote to his mom, my dear friend Lynda, and apologized for being such an idiot, she did what anyone would do in a situation like this and that is, invite the idiot to dinner.  So of course, I said yes and seriously had the time of my life.

I love this family so much.  We were missing Greg who is away at school and Rachel who is on her own mission far far away but we had the best time tonight.  That's Sterling up above helping John and Lynda fix dinner for us and the missionaries.

This is Aaron.  The girls at church love him. He hugs me a lot so the young women all wish they were me.

Dinner was yummy and then we had a super fun activity - we dyed the hair of the high school boys swim team! They are so awesome and are going to State this weekend and they all wanted to dye their hair blond.

This kid is apparently an incredible swimmer and will probably go to the Olympics in four years.

I am the envy of  nearly every young woman in my stake.

Lynda and me - waiting for the boys to get fully blondified.  Yes, that's a real word.

Some rinsed, some not.

These were really great boys and their hair turned out great.  I'd never dyed anyone's hair before so it was very fun to see it actually worked.  I'm kind of wondering why I pay someone to do mine.

Um, no, not really.

A crazy dinner party

My friends the Robinson's are awesome about inviting me over.  Our little joke is that I'm the sister wife (well, I'm second after Steve's iPad whom we have named Robyn...think "Sister Wives" TV show.)  Susan and I met at YW camp several years ago and since then, we have grown closer and become like family, really.  Her girls, Abbie and Emily were part of my recent taco adventure, you may recall.

Anyway, Susan was making honey lime enchiladas (YUM) and invited me to join them so I came over right after work on Monday.

Emily and me

Susan also invited the Jacobs family to join us.  Christi is in the stake YW presidency with me and I've so enjoyed getting to know her better this past year.

Christi, me and Susan WITH crazy-eyed Brooks, the photo bomb

And without the photo bomb

I'm usually bad about taking random pictures but I told the girls I needed to blog more so they humored me whenever I pulled out the camera.

Becca, Brooks, Abbie and Emily

Let's just say that Christi's son Brooks was in RARE FORM last night.  I'm thinking it had something to do with the sugar.  Well, and the fact that he had an audience of girls who laughed at everything he said or did. He's hilarious.

I knew I'd get a picture like this when I bought the Reddi-Whip.

AND like this...so love these girls!

Cute Eric came after basketball practice

3 out of 4 of the Robinson girls

I love my friends who invite me over and let me experience family craziness once in awhile. I think it's the best remedy for fighting off the dreaded January funk (you know I'll be blogging about that at some point, right?)

Fun with long-time friends

Nearly every January since 2005, I've gotten together with a small group of friends for dinner and catching up.  Our excuse initially was to celebrate two January birthdays but it's much more than a birthday party.

The group includes Patty, whom I've known since we were like 15 (she's the one I visit down south for General Conferences), Patty's sister Maile, who was my roommate during our early 30s, Lisa whom I've also known since I was a teenager and also Patty & Maile's youngest sister, Kanani.  The group also includes others I've met through these girls:  Heather, Robin and Marie.  I found some pictures of earlier gatherings:

Here's Marie, Lisa, Patty and me back in 2005.  I thought you guys would love to see my old hair.

 Patty and me in 2008.

Not everyone makes it every year but in 2010 we had Heather, Marie, me, Lisa, Maile, Kanani and Patty.  This was the white trash menu year - so many good things to eat! This was also the year that Maile and Patty didn't dress for the occasion. ;)

Here's our group this year.  Kanani was sick but Robin was able to come up from CA to join us which was awesome.  We laughed SO much and it was just the greatest to catch up with everyone.

Our food theme this year was anything pumpkin - which is Patty's favorite thing. I love catching up with these amazing women.  There have been marriages, babies, moves out of state and all sorts of other life changes and yet whenever we get together, it's like no time has passed.  We decided this year we need to add a second gathering in the summer and I hope we're able to do that.  Being with these wonderful women is exactly what I need to start my year off right.

A mini blog hop

Rather than repeat/copy everything my dear friend Kim put on her blog earlier today, I want all of you to go here and see the pictures from our Biggest Loser finale evening together. 

Please note the following:

• My blank stares in the first couple of pictures. 
• The really bad fake-sleeping. 
• The inappropriate pointing. 
• Koli's stupid pink pants

There is nothing like a good friend, is there???

Snaps for an excellent weekend

A couple of years ago, "Legally Blonde the Musical" was shown on MTV and I've kept it on my TiVo ever since. Since then, I've had Christina, Kim, Lynda and Rachel over to watch it and they loved it as much as me.

When I heard last year that the show was finally coming to our corner of the world, I knew we had to go. I bought Christina's ticket as her high school graduation gift and she flew up from Provo for the weekend. The morning of the show, we went to breakfast at this cute little place out in the country. So yummy! I'm still dreaming about the hash browns and bacon. Why does bad food have to taste SO good?

Finally, 5 PM came and it was time for our big night on the town. We had dinner at Old Spaghetti Factory before heading into the city. Ahh, mizithra cheese, how I love thee (again, why is food SO good?) My dear friend Boni joined us and got to experience the craziness that is us (so happy she did!)

Here we are downtown outside of the theater and note that we all wore pink because it's Elle Woods' signature color. We're cool like that.

The show was so darling and happy. Of course, they had to throw in stuff that wasn't in my TiVo'd Broadway version (i.e. naughtiness that was not necessary) but I still smiled throughout the whole thing. Christina and I were probably the most giddy about being there and we tried hard to not sing along out loud. :)

During intermission, we decided to try and take a self-portrait in front of the "no photography" sign - ha. Kim tried first but we decided that "kids" have better skills in taking self-portraits because Christina took this awesome one of us (okay, I love how I look in this one - yes, I'm vain. We've discussed that already. Get over it.)

We had such a good night. I'm so glad we take advantage of opportunities like this to see fun musicals when they come to town. I love making memories with fun experiences like this.

I'm so grateful for the special relationship I share with Christina. I know she used to think I didn't love her as much as I love her sisters (haha -- remember that, Chrissy??) but hopefully she knows now how much I totally love her. She's a beautiful, special, hilarious, smart, faith-filled young woman and I'm so proud and grateful to be her friend. Love you, Christina!

A bad day that turned into a good day

I had a bad morning -- one where I kept dropping things like bags of garbage and cardboard boxes in the rain. I had plans to go to get cupcakes and lunch with two of my favorite work friends but realized on the drive in that because we were so shorthanded, I needed to stay at work. Sigh.

I let my friends know right away that I couldn't go on our lunchtime field trip and encouraged them to still go. They brought back the cupcakes I'd requested for my mom (pineapple upside down!) Kim (triple chocolate!) and me (the usual!) But guess what else? They made a special trip to Panera for lunch and brought me broccoli cheddar soup and a red balloon to cheer me up. Friends are the best!!!

My fave conference tradition

When I was in my 20s, I started a tradition with my friend Patty. On General Conference Saturday, she'd come over with two AM/PM 32 oz diet cokes (does anyone else remember when they came out with those refillable plastic bottles??) I'd pull a bag of chocolate chip cookies out of the freezer (baked the night before and slightly undercooked so the texture would be perfect) and we'd have our own version of a "breakfast of champions." We'd lay on my bed and watch the first session of Conference together (the one that is always, always my favorite), enjoying the diet coke (yes, there's some irony there) and trying not to eat too many of the cookies.

This Friday night, I'm having dinner with my friend who is visiting from Chicago and then after dinner, making the nearly 3 hour drive to Patty's. Crazy, I know, but I can't not see my friend when he's here and I also don't want to miss my favorite session of conference with one of my dearest friends. I probably won't get there until nearly midnight but it'll be worth it.

It's been a long time since we watched conference together but I had to bake cookies tonight to surprise Patty and as soon as they're cool, they'll go in the freezer. This conference will be different from the ones 20 years ago in that Patty's married now and has 3 amazing boys. So besides the cookies, I'm bringing some conference activities for them (thanks to Kim and Sugardoodle.) It's going to be a great weekend!