Tithing Works

Just FYI.

A picture

Why would I like to show everyone a picture of my dirty house, you may ask.

Well, not only because it's cleaner than it usually is thanks to Peter, but also that Brita was sitting on the blanket (waaay back there) and moved herself to get her rightful silver spoon. Usually she just tries to move on the bed. I guess the cereal bowl was worth the trip across the carpet.

Happy Pioneer Day

Brita and I just went to the park for the Pioneer Day celebrations. It was say fun. If I had had my camera and it had been charged I would post really cool pictures (or at least picture of really cool things).

They had a old car show. The oldest one was from 1912. It had a little canopy thing with fringe. It was cute. They had the retail price on most of the cars. Most of them were between $350 and $550. Except there was one that was a 1928 Rolls Royce that was over $17,000. It was built for a guy in India who used it to hunt tigers. Just think of all the pictures of cool cars that could have been on my blog.

There were lots of booths set up with jewelry a stuff. They had one with statues that had black squiggly lines on them because horsehair was put on them when they were still warm from the kiln. And they had really nifty rocks and a felt turkey dinner.

The pioneer village was open too. We went in the schoolhouse. I want a school house like that someday. They had posters with common three letter and four letter words. And the alphabet had pictures like urn for U and vine for V. And the desks and benches were logs split in half. They had a blacksmith shop and a house and people weaving and things like that, too.

I think Brita's favorites were the live band and the free Costco water bottle.

And since you've made it this far I'll post some pictures of Brita from our last week's family home evening.

Careful, She Spits

So Brita's started drinking from a cup. Kind of. It's messy. She sometimes doesn't swallow and decides to become a fountain instead. Tonight she was drinking and got a big mouthful and decided to spit it out on the couch. Then she turned toward Peter (who wasn't worried because she just soaked the couch) and spit in his face. It was kind of funny. Brita and I laughed. Well, there were two members of the family laughing hysterically. Brita wasn't really one of them. She just looked confused. And cute. She always looks cute.

Look, they're in a row!

We were invited to a friend's house to have some cake. While there, the topic of conversation naturally included cake. I asked if she had seen a picture of our wedding cake, which she hadn't, so I'm posting a couple of pictures. Here you go, Dani (and whoever else happens to read my blog).

Just a little background on the cake... My sister, Monica, wanted us to have a cake so that we could experience a first anniversary freezer-burned piece of cake. She, Pamela, and Katrina happened to see a duck mold in a craft store, burst out laughing, and came up with the brilliant idea.

So, without further ado, I proudly present... my duck cake!





About a month after we were married, we had a strong craving for duck.. It was delicious (and not very freezer-burned). Thanks, Monica!

Red light, green light

Except it was all green lights except one. It was great. We just came down the canyon from Heber City and we only had one red light. It was pretty much amazing. It was the light by our house and we were making a right turn at it so we didn't even have to wait for the whole light. Utah traffic lights are of the devil.

We were up the canyon at a party for Peter's work. It was a fun party. They had all sorts of things to do. We didn't do any of them, but they were there. There was a climbing wall, a water slide, a blow-up jumpy thing, a get-yourself-in-a-harness-and-run-and-get-pulled-back thing, a kiddie pool, a treasure hunt, a pinata, water guns, a birthday party, a raffle, balloon animals, a magic show, all sorts of blown up toy balls and stuff, and other stuff. I watched the magic show. It was fun. Brita jumped on the jumpy thing. We won stuff in the raffle. And they had Famous Dave's. We ate a lot. It was really good.

And now Brita is crying.

Phred

Did I ever mention that I spelled my adviser's name wrong two separate times on my thesis defense presentation. HE had to keep correcting me. Yeah. That was embarrassing.

Dance Party

So we had a little unofficial dance party in the middle of our family home evening activity on Monday. Brita really liked "Duke of Earl" and even did the first part on "I will Survive." (But really how can you not do the first part on "I will Survive"?)




I love this picture. It reminds me of stake dances.

My Parents are Amazing

I just wanted to say that I love my parents. I don't think there are better parents than them anywhere. I was reading in the Marriage and Family Relations study guide about the roles of mothers and fathers and it just made me really grateful again for my parents.

I love my parents most because they love me and they act like it. Whenever I'm having a bad day I can call my mom and ask her if she loves me and I know she'll say yes. Even when it seems like everyone else in the world hates me. They go out of their way to do things for me and they make me feel like I'm wonderful even when I'm awful.

They protect me and take care of me. I remember pretending to be asleep when we would come back from D.C. when I was little just so dad would carry me in the house. He didn't like that, but I did. It's just nice to feel taken care of.

My parents are some of the smartest people I know. One time I asked a lady I did Cinderella class for how to be a good mom. Included in her list was "Learn everything you can about everything." My parents are like that. I remember asking my dad question after question on our trips across the country. He always knew the answer. At least it seemed like it. And they never lied to me. I hate being lied to.

Anyways, I was just thinking about them. I hope Peter and I can be as good of parents as my parents are.

Six Month Clothes

Before the trip we broke out Brita's six month including some new tights. We love tights. Here's the bull modelling her new tights. The pink bear is wearing Brita's new duck socks.

Swimming Brita

Last weekend was Brita's first time swimming.
She wasn't so keen on it at first, but eventually it grew on her.







We stayed in the pool until her feet were all sorts of wrinkly.

Wow

I just read the stupidest book. Peter and I started reading one of the Hardy boys books last night, but then we realized that it was not one of the original ones and that it was insanely bad. So we went back to the library and got a different one that was much better.

But then this morning I finished the other one. I feel stupider now. Just so you all know.

Cousins

Brita got to hang out with Ensley.

Brita needed to jump and luckily Ensley was nice enough to share her jumper. Then Ensley decided that Brita needed help jumping. I don't know how much Brita appreciated the help.

Telling secrets, or something like that.

They were both really interested in each other, but sometimes they just didn't want to be touched by the other person.

In the pool. Ensley loved the pool. Brita was starting to warm up to it by the second day.

Aren't they cute?

The Start of Many

Well, we all know that I can't just post once, so here's the start.

We went to North Carolina in part for a McNabb family reunion. It was fun. We swam and played games and talked and stuff. I got to meet lots of new people. Okay, actually I had already met a lot of them, but you know how I'm bad at remembering people? Yeah, I am.

So here is the family reunion group.