Hallie's birthday party

Last Friday we had Hallie’s birthday party. She was turning nine and wanted to have a sleep over, but we decided instead to have her friends over from 5-9 pm and wear their pjs and do fun things. They made their own little pizzas. (Which I forgot to take pictures of.)

Watched Camp Rock.

Played with Hallie’s hamster Jerry.

Painted nails.
Opened presents.

Decorated cupcakes.
And because we thought they had not made enough mess already. We had a fondue fountain to add to it.
And then after they were all good and sugared up; we waved good bye and sent them home to their parents to get them to calm down and go to bed.

Why do children do this?

Ok, so Jackson says that he wants a fruit rollup. So I go and get the snack basket down and the following is our conversation.
Me: Ok there is a blue. Blue. Green. (This whole time I am digging through the snacks trying to find more fruit rollups.) Blue.
Jackson: No, I want red.
Me: I dont think there are any more red.
Me: Blue, green, oh here is a red.
Jackson: No, I dont want red I want a blue.

Why do kids do this?

"I don't really want an answer. I just want to send this cosmic question out into the void."

Meg Ryan in You've Got Mail

Mmmm. I love this foot!

Grace loves her feet! And a few cute pictures of her and Grace and Carter and Tara.

Too many ignorant people in GA

Just a quick rant about people not using their heads in GA. I read recently that the national average of gasoline rose just $.05 over the weekend. Well here it rose well over $.60. Why? Because all the people here freaked out and went and got gas on Friday and Saturday because I guess they believed that Hurricane Ike, which was over 900 miles away, was somehow going to cut off the whole supply of oil to the state of GA. Man, if it really was that fragile of a setup, we'd have been in trouble a long time ago!! Almost every gas station we drove by on Saturday was out of gas, and we saw it for as much as $4.50 in some places, and it was around $3.60-$3.70 on Thursday.

Think people!! You're the same ones that complain about gas prices, and then you go and drive them up yourselves!

Hablo Español ... todavía

I was invited a few weeks ago to give a talk on the 14th in a Spanish group they are creating in a branch in our stake. So with some nerves, having not given a talk in close to 12 years in Spanish, I prepared my talk on Prayer. The group is small, but growing quickly, and after the 1 hr 15 minute drive, I made it out a bit early for the meeting. The meeting was simple and before me a poor Elder that was out only a month was also giving his first talk. Ahh, I remember how difficult that was. We opened my first area in my mission, there were no members there. For the first two weeks, before we had investigators, our Sacrament Meeting was just my companion and I. It was an eye opener.

Anyways, the talk went well. I was a bit nervous about the amount of vocabulary that I'd remember. I speak some from time to time at church since we've moved to GA, but not as much as I'd like. Well the talk went quite well, and I felt that I really kept their attention and felt that I was able to invite the spirit to the meeting, convey my message, and the Spanish felt great. Afterwards, I met some of the members and investigators, and there were quite a few from Guatemala, and almost all of them were from the area of my mission (there are 4 missions in Guatemala).

It was a great experience, and I was able to drive about an hour back and still make it back before our meetings ended in our ward. Maybe they'll ask me to do it again, I really enjoyed it, just not too soon.

59-0?!?!

Go mighty Cougars! Could they have had a more perfect game? Four touchdowns in the first 5 minutes of the second quarter. Everything went their way, and nothing went UCLA's way. Can't wait to see the polls tomorrow. Max Hall, Pitta, Collie, Unga looked great, and the entire defense too.

Got some cute pictures of Grace and Hallie, we'll try and get them posted later.

I love the Olympics and my DVR

...but apparently I don't love sleep as much. I have to say, this Olympic experience has been different for me than any other, and that has to do almost completely with the DVR. I just finally gave in and got one about a year ago, and it's been great. In fact, I hate it when I'm watching TV in another room and want to rewind and can't.

However, I've never enjoyed the DVR as much as I have for the Olympics. We keep the DVR in our room, since we typically only watch TV at night, after the kids are in bed, or we're in bed too, so we watch most of the TV in our room. This has been perfect for the Olympics. I just record everything and watch it at night, and start watching the primetime Olympics around 9-10pm and watch until midnight or one... or two... and skip all the commercials and other things that I might not be interested in.

I love it because I get to watch so more of the events that sometimes you miss during primetime. I love so many of the events, swimming, gymnastics, diving, track & field, basketball, beach volleyball, indoor volleyball (I love the men's indoor volley ball, Clay Stanley is a beast!), even trampoline.

But I have to say there have definitely been a few amazying things this Olympics. Michael Phelps is just unreal. The 4X100m freestyle relay was amazing, how we beat France, and then the 100m butterfly was just magical. I couldn't believe that he out-touched the other guy. From almost every camera angle until it was slowed down and from below, I thought it looked like he lost. Then the men's gymnastics team taking silver with their best two gymnasts injured and gone. Then Nastia Luikin and Shawn Johnson going 1-2 in the all-around.

Also I have to say that Usain Bolt (what a great name for a sprinter--Bolt) is a freak. He runs a 9.69, even while celebrating the last 15 meters! I could have done without the grandstanding, but what's this guy going to do when he gets a better start (he had probably the worst start in the group) and runs the whole way. Is 9.5 or even 9.4 out of the question? That's so stinking fast.

Then there's one thing that has just become an inside joke for Tara and I. On Saturday we were watching trampoline. It really is amazing, they jump like 20 feet in the air. Anyways, there was a Chinese man who competed who is named Dong Dong. No joke. Why would the parents do that? I guess there's probably some cultural explanation, but Tara and I start laughing at even the mention of the name now, so it gets thrown into conversation at random times now over the last few days.

So that's it. I highly recommend a DVR. Great for the Olympics and General Conference too (if you're LDS). And if you haven't tuned into the Olympics much, do it. You're missing out, and you're one of the few in America who's not watching :-)