Christmas traveling.

The airports are crazy!! We were supposed to fly out yesterday morning to Denver and then from Denver to Billings. We got to the airport about an hour early to check in. We knew it was going to be crazy so we made sure we got there with enough time.
As soon as we got to the airport we tried to check in with one of the computer check-ins. It said that our flight to Denver was delayed so we wouldn't be able to make our flight to Billings, so we got into the ticket line to try to figure out how we were going to get to Billings. We waited in that line for about an hour. It finally went to and passed the time that our flight was supposed to leave, but since it had been delayed it didn't matter. About twenty minutes later we finally got to the front of the line and got to speak with the man about our tickets. He looked and looked and couldn't find us any flights to get to Billings that day. We would have had to wait until today to Billings. The man found something from Delta, a straight flight to Billings. He called over to Delta and apparently they had oversold their seats because of a cancellation of an earlier flight. They also said we could take our original flight to Denver and spend the night there and then fly to Billings the next day. We didn't want to have to sleep over at an airport again. They found one other flight but it was on Sunday and we didn't think that was enough time to spend up in Billings. We had told Rita (Jason's mom) that we were just going to stay in Utah. So we asked for a refund and decided to drive. We thought it would be a good idea to keep it a secret and surprise Rita when we got there, she was very upset on that we weren't going to come up. I would have been pretty upset too if I were her, my baby boy not being able to come up for Christmas. The drive was pretty good most of the time. There were a few parts that were a little scary dangerous and I am soooo thankful Jason was driving. Long story short, we made it and are very thankful to be here! We wish everyone else a merry Christmas, and we will be back sometime on the 26th.

More Vegas.

I was just looking at the pictures I posted in the Vegas blog and I realized there is only one that has Janna in it and it's only of her arm. So, I am going to put up more pictures, and this time there will be some of everyone.

This is Janna and Tanner. Janna is taking a picture of something through Tans window.


This is Tan, Jan, and me about to get into the elevator to leave the hotel.


Jason is sad in this picture because Janna and Tanner had gotten their food about ten minutes before we did, and Janna had stuffed her food in his face.


There was some crazy fire show outside the Mirage and it was so Awesome!


This is us at the Creperie. Janna is taking the picture.

Celine Dion

Over the weekend Jason, Tanner, Janna and I went to Vegas. Janna and Tanner went to Cedar City on Friday and we were to pick them up the next morning on our way to Vegas. We went to bed and woke up at 5:30 to shower and get ready to leave by six. The night before it had been raining a lot, so it wasn't that big of a surprise when we got in the car and it had started to snow. The roads were alright for a little while and progressively got worse. It was like a cycle it would be fine, then it would start to rain, then it would start to snow, then it would rain again, and then it would be fine. We made it to Cedar city and picked up Tanner and Janna, we stopped at McDonalds on our way out to get something to eat and to use the restrooms. The stinking McDonalds had flat screen tv's on the walls. It was crazy! They also had tv's in the restrooms!

We made it to Vegas, and it was so nice to see buildings instead of the desert scenery, full of shrubs and joshua trees. Our first stop was at an outlet mall. Jason chose it because it had an Adidas outlet and a nike outlet. They didn't really have that many sales in the Adidas outlet so we kept walking to see what other stores they had and we found another Adidas outlet, they had some pretty good sales and that made Jason and Tanner happy. Tanner got some awesome looking shoes.

We started to get really hungry so we went to our hotel to check in. They had an electronic check in (maybe I haven't been to hotel in a while) but I thought that was really neat! We checked in and put our stuff in the room, and then drove to In'N'Out. We ate and watched a "mustang club" out the window. Before we realized they were a mustang club we were wondering why they were looking at a mustang instead of the Porche 911 Turbo. Haha.

After In'N'Out we decided to try to find an outlet store we had driven past on our way into Vegas. After only a few minutes we found it. The outlet had stores like 'Armani' 'Dolce & Gabana' 'White House, Black Market' 'David Yurman' 'Adidas' and tons of others. They had so many good sales. We went into Dolce & Gabana and found most of the items were on sale... There was a red fur jacket on sale for only $6,000!! Haha. They also had a skirt on sale. It was pink and it was about knee length, I was actually considering buying it (It was on sale for only $30). We pulled it off the hanger and realized there was a slit in the side of it, it would have gone clear up to my upper thigh! I didn't want to get because then I would have had to sew it and I wanted to buy something to be able to wear to the Celine Dion Concert that we were going to that night. We kept walking and found a Banana Repulic outlet store and found a dress. It was perfect! (Also on sale)

We got back to the hotel and got ready for Celine. We then went to the strip. Our hotel had an entrance to the Monorail. We had gotten monorail day passes which would last 24 hours. We got to the monorail and there was a monster brand projection thing that projected a pond onto the ground and when you stepped in it, it would make ripples as if you were really walking in the pond. It was amazing. I really want one! Anyways...

We went to the Venetian and oh my goodness!!! The place is even more awesome than I thought it would be! Janna tried telling me about it and seeing it in real life was just so much better. The ceilings were painted like the skies they even had the gondola's they traveled from inside the shops to the outside, it was amazing. We walked around the strip for a little bit and then finally it was time to go to Caesars palace and see Celine Dion.

We got to Caesars, went through security, went up the stairs and got to our seats. This was the worst, having to wait for her to start. Finally after waiting even past the time on our tickets, IT STARTED! There was a screen on the back of the stage with stairs projected on it. Celine was at the top, and started walking down, lights went out and she was further down the stairs walking down, the lights went out again and she was on the stage!!! Everyone started freaking out. It was incredible. The whole concert was amazing. The only thing that wasn't good, was the directors style. It was awful. To quote Jason, "If I were to take a bunch of trash and throw it on the stage, it would still look better than that" (In reference to the stage and random junk in the show). Celine was fabulous though. At the beginning they had security and made everyone check in their cameras. Tanner and Janna brought them and tanner had to check his in and so did Janna, but somehow they smuggled it in... So we took some pictures. After the show we walked around again. Got some gelato, went into Tiffany's, and Jimmy Choo. It said sale on the window and when we went in to see what they had (just to look at the prices) we didn't see any sale! Haha.

The next morning we went back to the Paris and went to a little place called "La Creperie" It was amazing. They had HUGE crepes! They were so good. We all got some, they had some dessert crepes, and they also had crepes stuffed with actual food. After the Crepe store we left and came home. The whole trip was amazing. I loved it all.

Good Old Utah

The weather here has been pretty nice the past week. (Other than the cold). Cold weather doesn't bother me as much as cold weather plus snow. Yes, this morning we got up at about nine. I turned on the tv to watch/listen to Law and Order:SVU (thank you Tivo) from the kitchen while I did some dishes and made breakfast. As I was washing the dishes I got a glimpse of outside and it looked unusually white. I cracked the blinds and saw SNOW! Yesterday it was raining a lot, and I knew the news said it was going to snow, but it surprised me how much snow there actually was! It was ridiculous. Here is a picture right out our front door.






I don't really know what it is about snow that makes me want to hibernate until spring. I think it might just be the cold, and the fact that people are very scary drivers in the snow, especially in Utah. I really think snow is beautiful. The thing I don't like about it is the cold, and more than the cold, I don't like the wetness of it. I really need to invest in some really really warm clothes and then some water-proof clothes to keep the cold and wet out.

Service... and Suspected abuse...

Last night I went visiting teaching and the message I gave was on serving others. In General Conference one of the brethren spoke on service (I can't remember which brother) and he said that we needed to go out of our way to help people. For instance when visiting teaching, you aren't just supposed to ask if they need something but to do acts of service.

I park my car at my parents house instead of parking at UVSC because I don't want to pay for a parking permit. Anyways... I was going down the hill by the Majors house and I drove past a little girl (about 11 years old) walking up the hill, in shorts! I was taken back, shocked. I didn't really know what to think so as I drove past her I slowed down just in case she gave off any sign that she needed help. I passed her and another car was going up the hill and also passed her, I looked in the rear-view mirror and saw her kind of give a little "help me" wave. I turned around and headed back toward her. She was walking up the side of the road that doesn't have a sidewalk (the left side) and I pulled up on the right side, rolled down my window and asked if she needed help, or if she was going to Lakeridge and if she wanted a ride, of course she said yes. She was wearing shorts and a little windbreaker jacket type thing, her lips were extremely chapped and her skin was bright red from the cold. I would have said yes too. Before she got in the car I told her she shouldn't normally get in the car with strangers. (This world isn't very safe anymore, and it sucks). She got in and I asked her why she was walking to school, she told me her mom was making her walk. I asked her why she was wearing shorts then, and she told me it was because she didn't have any pants. I didn't really know what to say. As I took her to Lakeridge she told me that she lived across the street from the church and that her dad was in Iraq. I told her that I used to play nightgames at that church and she told me that she still does (in the spring and summer) and her mom lets her go play night games to "get her out of her hair". We got to Lakeridge and I dropped her off in front. I asked her if that was alright and she said she had to call her mom as soon as she got to school so it was good to be in the front. I was still in shock that the girl was wearing shorts and walking in the freezing cold weather this morning. I wasn't really sure if I should call someone or who to even call. I decided to call my mom and tell her the story. The girl had told me where she lived and I asked my mom if she knew anyone who lived there. She told me she thought it was the house that has foster children but she wasn't sure. I also told the story to Tanner and he said I should have gone inside Lakeridge and told them what happened, and maybe I still should... I'm not really sure. I just thought it was crazy. Some of the things she said and again, being outside in that cold of weather, IN SHORTS!!!!! How could any mother do that, and not drive your kid. I understand that she may not have been able to take her to school, and she may not be able to afford pants, but there are ways to take care of your children without that much money. I just kind of needed to share this story.

Black Friday.

We drove past Best Buy in Orem and there were tents and cars parked right in front of the store as if they were in the line. It was ridiculous. We changed our minds and decided to go home to sleep and go in the morning to see if they had anything good. We woke up at around 8 and went over to Best Buy. They were completely out of the cheap laptops and desktops. We found a digital camera that was 7.1 megapixels with a 12x optical zoom, not digital, OPTICAL! It was only 189.99 and they had quite a few left. We called Tanner and told him they still had them and we would hold onto it until he got there. So I guess there was a reason we went. Haha. It was still fun. Jason went and played basketball with cousin Davey, and Tan Tan... So I had about two hours to go to Target to see if they had some movies my mom wanted. While I was there I found that they still had ClearPlay dvd players and they were one sale! Ours had just stopped working about a week ago. What I mean is, when we would put a dvd in the player it wouldn't recognize that there was a dvd in it. It was very annoying. We tried cleaning it but it wouldn't recognize the cleaning dvd in it. Long story short I bought the new clearplay dvd player. It is very nice. It works better than the old one. It's smaller and it lights up a really cool blue color when you turn it on.

Thanksgiving weekend...

This Thanksgiving... We ate dinner at the Jaynes, we were asked to bring rolls, and if I had the time we were to bring a chocolate pie. We got a ride with my family and played some games before dinner. Jason and I had gone to the Thanksgiving morning sale at K-mart. We were going to see if they had any wii's and they gave out vouchers at four in the morning! We got there at six because the store was supposed to open at seven. Anyways... Long story short, they were out of wii vouchers when we got there so we decided to stay in line and get some of the board games that they had buy one get one free. We got Clue, Monopoly, Scrabble, and Candy Land. So we brought them with us to the Jaynes. Dinner was great. The potatoes were amazing, the Turkey was actually pretty moist, and so many rolls!!!! After dinner we played some more games took naps, and then had dessert. There were so many pies, there had to be about 10 of them. After we had eaten pie and played scrabble (Jason, aunt Elaine, and I) the David Howell family came over and their children. We sat and talked and talked. We talked pretty much about everything. We drove back to Orem to pick up the car and go home to Provo. We had been planning on going to the black Friday sale in the morning so we decided to check and see how long the line for best buy was. (We were going to wait in line all night to get a laptop for 399 and also a desktop for 199). (more in next post)