A very busy weekend

WOW, so last weekend was sooooo busy! Just a quick recap, because it'd be boring if I went into all the gritty details. Do notice that every "=>" signifies a change in location. :D

Saturday

=> After visiting Cyprus CU, we found out that will have to head back yet a third time before we'll be able to successfully open our joint banking account.

=> Jake stayed home while I popped out to Rachel Hammond's bridal shower in Salt Lake City. I've been excited about going for a while, not just because she was one of my favorite companions on the mission, but because the shower was in my neck of the woods for once. You can imagine my glee when I found out that it was the same day as the Salt Lake marathon, and it took me almost 20 minutes just to get from South Salt Lake to the Avenues. Also, sadly, I couldn't stay for the whole thing because of the next activity on this bulleted list:

=> Jake and I finally got out to the temple! Yay! We went and did sealings at the Salt Lake Temple. I'd never done it before, and it was the first time doing something in the temple with Jake since Thanksgiving. Loved it!

=> Jake and I got to see The Hasty Heart 4 o'clock matinee at the Hale for free (totally worth volunteering there every month or so). I had no idea what kind of play it would be, but I really liked it! I want to check out the movie version of it, too. Also, since every single actor on the stage had to have a completely different accent, and having this little dream of being an accent coach, I had lots of fun watching it.

=> I had to really buckle down and start studying the 170 study guide questions for my scheduled final on Monday. Thank heavens Jake was patient enough to quiz me for almost an hour before bed. It helped me a lot!

Sunday

=> We went to church.

=> We left church after the first two hours to go to Cassie Burton's homecoming. It was nice hearing a missionary fresh from the field. I have a soft spot for missionary stories.

=> Didn't get to do the mix'n'mingle after the homecoming because we had to stop by Tyler Koefed's place for me to review the rest of the songs I have in The Sound of Music. We usually don't rehearse on Sundays, but we had to make an exception due to lack of time... anyways, that's where Jake and I met our first chiweenie!! *sigh* I think that when we're ready to get a dog, we're probably going to try to look up a chiweenie.

=> Emma's birthday party!! Always a delight. We felt bad not being able to get her a present, and had an idea for what we could have done for her after the fact... Heck, we might still do it if she wants.

=> What a better way to finish up such a busy weekend with some more studying for my final on Monday. Thank heavens it's over, and I didn't bomb it. That's what I call a successful weekend.

Baby Shower & Sound of Music

Hello, all. It's Jake again. Maybe I'll be able to finish the post this time. We'll see. Alright, so let me reiterate what I mentioned in my former blog post - Faith is not pregnant. This baby shower was once more for Aubree, this time for the Magna folk. Unfortunately, Aveline (the baby) can't decide when she wants to be born, so the proud parents-to-be were not able to come down to Magna for the shower. Instead, we collected gifts and made a road trip to Logan to deliver them to Travis and Aubree. Faith continued her family's tradition of making a hooded towel for the newborn. It turned out fantastically.

Travis keeping track of gifts received

Aubree sporting the stylish hooded towel!

It's like Christmas, only not!

After the baby shower we went to a local place in Logan called Angie's where we all ate and generally had a good time. Aubree has been in and out of labor and the hospital three times this week, so we hope to have a brand new niece by Easter! Congratulations!

On that congratulatory note, let me take a personal bragging moment to say that Faith has been cast as Maria in The Sound of Music at the Empress! She is so excited to play the part, and I am equally excited for her! She was selected from more than a dozen auditioning Marias to play the role. She knocked them dead with her solo and cold read at callbacks.

Yours truly will be playing an evil Nazi named Herr Zeller. I was initially not terribly thrilled with the part, but am excited to go out of the box and play the evil guy for once. Should be fun. Ish. Anywho, the play runs June 10-July 2. Be there or be square!

We're still doing great!

Until next time...

Mission Reunions and General Conference

Last week, Jake and I were able to go to each other's mission reunions! They're usually on the same night, but mine was on Thursday instead of Friday for some reason, so we went to mine first, then to Jake's on Friday night. Jake said, and I agree, that it's less awkward when you're the one going to the other person's reunion. Then you know you're not expected to recognize and be chatty with anyone there. You just get to be a trophy. ;) And they were so different; mine was potluck, but Jake's was catered by J Dawg's (delicious, by the way). Mine had a spiritual thought and an update on the mission, and Jake's had entertainment provided by their ex-missionaries. Pretty cool.

Then Conference! Yay for not having to get up early to go somewhere! It was our first time in a GREAT number of weeks... I don't even remember the last time we didn't have to be somewhere early-ish on Saturday. We watched Saturday's sessions at our apartment, our first and last chance to do so there. Jake watched the Priesthood session with his family, and swung over my family's place afterwards for our traditional post-Priesthood session ice cream. Then, since someone had left the house unlocked that Jake and I are going to move into this month, we figured we'd better go over there and lock it back up, after showing off our new "chez nous" to our family. Boy, there were a lot of people there. I'd been psyched about living somewhere more than 4 times bigger than the 400 sq. ft. apartment we have right now, but having about 19 people in there at once, it felt pretty teeny.

Saturday night we hurried out for some bacon and flour so we could make Jake's family's traditional Conference breakfast, with eggs, bacon, and cinnamon rolls. I made them from scratch Saturday night, and we baked them Sunday morning. I don't like to sing my own praises, but they did turn out a-mighty-mighty gooood.

yummers... and that's even before I frosted them.

We had fun at the birthday get-together for Garret and Momba on Sunday after Conference. Their birthday "cake" was actually a peach cobbler that my Mom had my Dad make because Jake like's peach stuff. She loves to "spoil" the in-laws. After all, they chose to be in the family. Garret, if you're reading this, I have a gift planned for you, I just haven't had the chance to get it together yet!! Hold on!

Yay, birthdays!