Thanks

I am also so very grateful around this time of year with Thanksgiving just two days away.  However sometimes I wish my television shows would not be so grateful as to give me a week free.  What to do with a week of no school and no television shows worth watching?  Husband's at work.  A blizzard is about to dump itself across the Salt Lake Valley for the next 24 hours. No decent TV. 

I can't wait until NEXT WEEK.

November

Many things have happened in November I have been excited to record, yet haven't quite found the time.  Here they are:

Viva Las Vegas!

The weekend of November 13th, I drove down to Vegas (home) for 4 days to spend the time with my family and friends.  My dad's 54th birthday was Saturday, so we went to PF Changs as his request.  My mother decided to order the entire happy hour menu so we filled up on that and had left overs and had the waitress box up the three entrees we also ordered! Nice lunch with the mom dad and brother, something just the four of us hadn't done since I was probably five.  The next day my mom took us all shopping and were all lucky to pick out whatever we wanted from Kohls/Victoria Secrets/ Dicks.  Quite the treat. 

Dad.  Happy Birthday!

Mom.  Her visits are always amazing.

Blake Blake Blake!

I also came down to Vegas that weekend to see Blake after 2 years apart.  He called me one afternoon and I answered not knowing who is was and was shocked by the maturity in his voice.  Seeing him at church and hearing how much his mission had changed his life was really wonderful.  I'm glad we went.  I'm glad he loved it.  I'm especially glad he's home. 

The last dinner before Blake entered the MTC.  He was set apart so no more hugs for 2 years.

 Babies

Somehow it still blows my mind how fast little babies grow up.  I remember when my two little cousins were just babies and I all I could do with them was hold them.  Now they are both talking.. and walking.. and have little personalities of their own.  I had so much fun playing with them and spending time at my cousins house.  I hung out with my cousin Jung's fiance, Megan and I am so excited that she is going to be part of our family.  How patience and kind and loving she is with little Rexi.  I am amazed and impressed with her constantly. 

Rexi at 4 months.

Kara at 2 months

both of them in July.  They have hair.  They are so big.  They are cute.  Rexi looks like me.

 

HP7

Normally, I would say I love Harry Potter, but I'm not completely crazy about it like most.  I have read all the books and have seen all the movies, most at midnight, but I never am crazy about it... well until now.  I have this new thing where when I drive long distances I listen to an audiobook.  The book of choice this weekend was obviously the 23 hour long Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  I listened to it driving to and from Las Vegas, as well as in my car and at my house once I got home.  Finally I finished it.  Days later the movie came out.  I was not going to see this one, however, at midnight at fear that I would fall asleep during it so we planned on seeing it Saturday afternoon, matinee. Little did I know facebook would BLOW UP over how amazing it was, and my patience wore thin and I went ALONE and watched it Friday afternoon.  I laughed, I cried, I smiled, I love Harry Potter.  Thank you for being apart of my childhood and continuing this magical journey into adulthood.  

Basketball

The season has officially begun.  It truly is a bitter sweet thing to have this new season underway.  I look back at least season and remember how much fun and joy it brought, but I also remember how exhausted I and especially Lance was after each week.  Oh yeah, and the minor detail that he is ALWAYS at Jordan High School.  This season much like any other begins with a Meet the Team night.  Each team (sophs and JV) split and play each other, and then the Varsity team plays this team full of special needs children.  How fun it was to watch these 16 and 17 year old boys have allow the other team to make as many shots as they could and steal the ball from right out of the Beetdigger's hands.  Such a fun game to watch and how exciting it is for Lance.  He comes home everyday and thinks of what he needs to coach at tomorrow's practice.  He is always so excited at the possibility of his team exceeding their potential.  You can tell the moment he talks about basketball season, his entire face lights up.  There are some perks for me as well:

• The players are like my little brothers/friends.  They talk to me and make jokes and we have fun.

• Lance looks freaking hot in slacks and a tie. So now I get to see him in them 3 times a week instead of just on Sundays. 

•  I have a reason to not be stuck at home/library studying!  There's a game to watch.

SNOW 

 So, I was unware when we moved into our new home that its wonderful location would be its downfall.  Here, so conveniently located next to the highway and Park City Canyon, we can travel in any direction, down town, Sandy, West Jordan, Bountiful, in under 20 minutes.  What a joy our neighborhood is with all our neighbors out exercising past our house and saying Hi as we walk our dog.  We also love our ward, but one thing I don't love is living in SNOW!  Here, with just all the major ski resorts on the opposite side of the mountain we live on, we accumulate more snow than almost any other place in the valley.  All of our neighbors have invested in snowblowers.  I remember hearing stories from my father's childhood about how much snow they would have to shovel from their hour and how much he hated it.  I however, got a little excited about shoveling I grabbed the shovel Sunday morning and began working away without any real method to my maddness.  After about 1/4 of our LOOOONNNGGG driveway I gave up and handed the shovel to Lance who had just been out plowing snow for his dad since 5:30 am.  He finished half of our driveway and went back inside to get ready for church.  After church ended, I was so mentally consumed with the idea of finishing the shoveling.  Every other house around my driveway looked perfect as if no snow had even fallen on it.  I began working and got all the snow from the driveway as well as our walkway and long sidewalk (since we live on the corner).  I finished and felt such a sense of accomplishment.  Walked inside.  20 minutes later. MORE SNOW.  This time it was just enough to cover everything I had just shoveled, and quickly turned into ice.  - we did not have any salt and it was Sunday so we didn't go buy any until Monday-   But Monday came, I bought the salt and tossed it over our frozen driveway my little car had trouble getting up and now its all gone.  My driveway looks dry and perfect. Wonderful. a

4 4 4 4 

Lance and I have been officially MARRIED for 4 months.  Yeah, I know most people don't celebrate the months of their marriage and it's slightly middle schoolish like celebrating 2 weeks of dating, but I love that Lance brings home roses counting the months we've been married (which has continued since he used to do it when we were just dating as well).  So yesterday I received 4 roses symbolizing these past four months of us being married.  Let me tell you, married life flies by way faster than the dating life.  Lance and I were engaged for 4 months and it felt like an eternity.  Four months of marriage has been busy, but wonderful. 

Election Day

This day was a little surreal for me.  While I love voting and politics and knowing whats going on with our nation, this is the first time I can claim (since having a driver's license) that I am not a resident of Nevada but a resident of Utah.  Seeing names on the ballot whom I wasn't extremely familiar with stunned me.  I felt as if I was so unprepared and needed to know a lot more on the stances of the various political parties. 

 It's okay.  I love America.  I love that we are given the agency to vote for our officials.  I love Utah, but I do love and miss Nevada (especially because Nevada's Birthday was on the 31st of October and I didn't get to celebrate with school off.

Halloween

On another note- This past weekend was Halloween!  Friday night friends gathered to have a murder mystery party.  In the end I, Zetta, ended up killing Sam (Russell) because he had pictures of me kissing another man and was blackmailing me. 

The rich mob gangster who owned the local Speakeasy and his girlfriend, the famous Hollywood silent film star. 

Another speakeasy owner and his main girl

Sam, the blackmailing fool who got stabbed in the back and his waitress

 (i don't know what happened to the couple picture of Jessie and Conor- sorrrry!)

365 Days Together

Lance and Christine's ONE year Anniversary of dating. I know it seems a little weird that we would even celebrate such an event since we're married and now we have a wedding anniversary, but I have never had, in my entire life, celebrated a one year anniversary.  I think its exciting and an accomplishment to be with someone for 365 days and only love them more than you did on day one.  For those of you who don't know, these are pictures from our day one.  

Lance picked me up from my apartment in Provo and we drove in his Scion (which he now doesn't have) to the start of the walk to Bridal Veil Falls.  It was my first blind date and I wasn't sure is he was going to be a complete weirdo, so I decided to bring my Canon Rebel with us to take some pictures when the conversation was a little dull. 

 We walked along this path together and whenever he would make a sarcastic remark I pretended it insulted me and I would cross the line and go into the other "lane" only to have Lance follow me and brush my shoulder with his. 

 We didn't know as we walked the path that this would be our last first date and blind date for the rest of our lives. We didn't know that night held our first kiss and first real sparks.  We didn't know we'd end up in our cute little box on the hillside of the Wasatch Mountains.  We didn't know we'd fall madly head over heels with each other after only a week, and be married 10 months later. 

If we would have known all of this then, Lance's cute little smile would have been even bigger and he wouldn't have denied me when I tried to take a picture with him by saying "I don't take pictures with people on the first date."

Motivation

So I've come to be extremely grateful for a husband who knows me so well.  Over the last week or so I've been lacking serious motivation to do anything especially school.  We were out walking Ellie one night and he suggested that I should start running again to train for a half-marathon so I would have some motivation and drive to accomplish something.  That very next day while I was searching through our junk mail I came across a letter addressed to me for Team in Training.  I opened it up to discover that it is a team you can join which helps you train for events such as a marathon while raising money for Cancer!

  I went online to research further and discovered that the team pays for your entry fees, travel and accommodations and all you have to do is train, race, and get people to sponsor you to raise money for cancer. 

 These are the three scheduled races for this upcoming Spring, and yes that does indeed say PARIS, FRANCE!

 Anyone interested in joining come to a meeting and meet the coach and fellow runners!

 

And this is where my motivation finally jumped back to normal.  When I saw the opportunity to go to France I immediately called Lance and told him we BOTH needed to strap on our running shoes.  After looking at the race's website I found out that nearly 40,000 people are in this one race.  People from all over the world and you get to experience France like no one ever has before.  Now I am all for training and running, but 26.2 miles seems a little out of reach for me.  I guess I will just have to keep Paris in the back of my mind each time I think I can't run another step.  

 

Here's the course for the 26.2 miles!!

A trip down south

South to St. George Lance and I went to spend the weekend with his 3 best friends and their wives!  Minus the fact that I was almost fired for taking the time off, the weekend was so much fun. We were supposed to leave Friday night at 6:30, but didn't get going until nearly 8pm.  Saturday we had a tennis tournament couples v. couples and after Robert and Laura won, the boys decided to play against each other.  The four girls went to the store and when we came back the boys were STILL playing!  Sunday we went to church and it was the Primary Program. After we headed to the temple and learned so much about its construction.  For example:
1. The little windows at the tops were originally the window for a little apartment and people would actually stay in the temple.
2.  The tower was struck by lightening and broke off and had to be replaced.
3. Christopher Columbus received the high priesthood.

Overall, successful weekend. The end.

Espana

Last night I was surfing the web and looking at restaurants within the Salt Lake valley.  I stumbled upon Cafe Madrid and was rather intrigued, so I looked at their menu.  Top of the list was tapas- in particular Tortilla Espanola.  I was in utter shock when I saw they were charging 22 dollars an order!!  After drooling over just the thought of being able to eat them, I then began to research a recipe for a Spanish Tortilla.  

Let me back up a bit for those of you who have never eaten a Spanish Tortilla.  It isn't a piece of corn or flour, but more of an omelet.  It's traditionally eggs, potatoes, and onion chopped up and fried to make almost a pie shape.  

So I went to the grocery store and purchased the ingredients (yes just a potato and an onion since I had everything else) and came home and began chopping them up into little pieces.  I placed them into hot oil and began frying them until they were golden brown.  I then strained them and began to whisk a few eggs and then placed them all together in a different (smaller) pan.  

One tricky thing is you have to flip the tortilla while the top is still raw egg so you have to use a plate to cover the top and flip it without spilling the egg everywhere! 

and ah ha!!! HERE's my tortilla espanola!!!!

Making this tortilla today has reminded me of my amazing trip to Spain in the summer of 2007.  Seeing all the wonderful sites and wonderful food.  The people.  The language.  The people I took the trip with.  Overall, amazing. 

The battle still continues.

Since I began college in my mind I knew I wanted to do something in the medical field.  I am over analytic and like to look at every possibly facet before I make any decision (which sometimes makes people think I can't make up my mind).  I entered Brigham Young with a yearning to be a nurse and pre-nursing is exactly where I ended up.  After a semester and a half, and seeing the competition and blood-shedding personalities of other pre-nursing students I decided that it wasn't right for me.  I still wanted to pursue something medical, but the competition had me hidden away in a hole never wanting to come out.  I began my research into physicians assistant graduate school and thought it to be a perfect fit for what I aspired for my life.  I then changed my major to Exercise Science and began my journey from the beginning, through taking Physics 105.  While in high school, I loved physics, but college physics in an entirely separate world.  I HATED PHYSICS, plus I wasn't very good at it leading my decision to sway away from the difficult, almost medical school science classes and back towards nursing.  I changed my major once again to Exercise and Wellness which is more geared toward the body's overall health through proper diet and exercise.  At BYU, I have never had a semester in which I enjoyed what I learned more.  No more 300 person lecture halls.  No more busy science classes which have no direct purpose.  No more learning about things I saw no practicality or interest in.  I was finally done and had finally found my niche.  

 I began to mark my course toward fulfilling the prerequisite courses for an accelerated bachelor's degree in nursing.  I figured it was my only shot to my dream career, but in the process was discouraged by my lack of GPA and the increasing competition.  I within my dreams out of an accelerated bachelor's and into an associates figuring it was more achievable.  The week of my honeymoon I was pleasantly surprised to find out my name had left the waiting list and I was officially accepted as a nursing student.  What joy overwhelmed my soul as I finally felt I had captured my dream after such a long journey.  The floating on cloud nine feeling, however, slowly was washed away when the costs for tuition revealed I would need 36,000 in student loans to fulfill my associates RN.  For a week I battled with the idea of going into debt for dream, or giving it all up in hopes of being accepted into a more cost effective program.  As I knelt in prayer in the temple, I was overwhelmed many feelings, some too personal to share.  My main gut feeling, however, was to forgo the expensive program and seek happiness in another realm.  To keep going and be persistent in what I want, and eventually doors opening up.  

Now it's come to the point that my dreams of being a nurse verse being a physicians assistant are back into my mind competing for my full attention.  Do I stretch myself and challenge myself to fulfill the rigorous courses associated with a masters degree? Do I work my way up from a nursing associates to a masters in the 5 years of schooling it would take?  Do I jump in head first into the possibility of having to move to a different state to achieve my education?  The unanswered questions I have been left with are only consuming my every thought and are sometimes too much to bare.  

Mormon.org

In General lets talk about Conference

This past weekend = General Conference.

Due to my new job, Lance and I were unable to go to Idaho (his Grandparent's farm) for the weekend.  He was pretty bummed, but I think the weekend turned out better than expected.  I worked my long shift for Saturday, but I was able to watch the majority of the morning session with my residents.  I sat next to a man who is a retired plastic surgeon, as well as a previous singer in the Mormon Tabernacle!  His attentiveness (even though he had Alzheimers) proved to me the power of enduring to the end.  We enjoyed the words which were spoken, and I was so grateful to be able to go home and watch the afternoon session we had recorded on our DVR. Saturday Afternoon Session, I loved Elder Cong's talk about looking through the mirrors in the temple and seeing himself as a son, grandson, great-grandson as well as a father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. The significance and influence one convert has on their posterity is truly infinite.  I kept thinking of when Lance and I got married and the opportunity we are giving our future family because of our sealing for time and eternity!  How amazing is that!

Overall, I thought a major theme to the conference was #1 listen to the prophet.  Many speakers hit on this specific topic.  Two even quoted the 14 Fundamentals of a Prophet talk, which was the same talk I researched for my own talk I gave the week before conference.  These principles are extremely important, and I have a feeling as if in the sessions to come, the Prophet will ask of us, guide us, and inform us to do things that we might otherwise find different, but we have been instructed repeatedly to listen and follow.   And the other lesson from conference which stuck out in my mind was #2 not turning our virtues into vices.  Not excessively doing something, and not falling into an addiction.  To let our good qualities and characteristics show, but never being excessive or being too much of one thing.  This I found super interesting since there is a book I purchased a year ago entitled Extremes.  I read the first chapter and then got caught up in my studies, only to pick it back up a month ago and begin reading it again.  It gives wonderful examples of how to be champions, while still remaining humble.  Conference always makes me think of the areas in my life which need a little improving.  It motivates me to be a better person, and strive to be as Christ like as possible.  I love the opportunity we are given to hear inspired words. 

What I believe- LDS.org

Busy Busy Busy

Over the last month Lance and I have been two chickens with our heads cut off and I only see it getting busier and busier!  We both started school for the fall semester, my classes being mainly from 5-10pm and his being online and consuming his morning from 5-7am.  Lance also began a new job as a Teacher's Assistant for the school district.  There is this program here for Youth in Custody, where it helps kids in high school catch up so they can eventually graduate.  The main teacher over the program at Kearns High School's name is Sally. A recent development would be APPLE'S plan to take over the world!  They gave Kearns High a grant to supply all its students with Ipod Touches and all the teachers with Ipads.  If only Lance could somehow classify as a teacher to get that Ipad, it would be heaven.   Having opposite schedules with your newlywed husband is less than ideal.  While he is teaching at Kearns all day, I'm at home studying and getting ready for school.  When he comes home, I'm in class and finally make it home in time to have a 20 minute conversation as we are both getting ready for bed.  To top it all off I am officially employed!  I began working at Sunrise Senior Living in Sandy as a Care Manager (CNA).  I absolutely love my job, those I work with, and the residents who live there.  I am within the Alzheimer's division, and the people are so sweet.  However, my schedule has me working crazy hours such as 8 hours Thursday and Friday night and a 13 hour shift on Saturdays!  There goes any aspect of having a social life!  With all the stresses and lacking time, there's always a bright side!  This past Saturday after my 13 hour shift, I received a text from Lance instructing me to not buy any dinner, but that he had a date night planned (oh how I have missed date night).  I came home and showered, and soon he also came home with a delicious pizza and a gigantic chocolate chip cookie we just had to put in the oven and bake for 10 minutes.  We cuddled up on the couch and enjoyed Wall Street from 1987 and both ended up falling asleep a half hour before its ending.  Oh its the little things.

Where in the world is Ellie?

So lately Lance and I have had to put Ellie, our puggle, in her kennel when we leave and when we are sleeping because she likes to pee in places I hate cleaning up.  She is quite the smart dog and likes to hide under our bed until we are sound asleep before jumping into our bed.  Last night I even tried to trick her with peanut butter to get her to come out from under the bed.  This morning however, I knew she was wandering around the house and when I went looking for her I walked right past her twice because I never would have thought she would sit in the bed with her gigantic gorilla.  But there she was.  curled up in a ball on top of the gorilla that I have sitting in her doggie bed.  Too cute. 

Wedding: finally posted

So 19 days ago, Lance and I were sealed for time and eternity!

This day was absolutely beautiful. We arrived at the temple at 7:30am only to be greeted by his dad (Elliott), my cousin (Jung), and my adopted Mormon mom (Roz). Everyone at the Salt Lake Temple was nothing but helpful and so happy that we had chosen to be sealed in that temple. I had heard many times that the SLC temple treats you like a number and rushes you because they have so many brides to tend to, but Roz and I both didn't feel like that, even though there were 17 other brides that morning. Moments before Lance and I entered the sealing room, our sealer came to get to know us. He began by saying, "Hi I'm Brother Combs, I hear you are in the Olympus 2nd Ward is that correct? Well welcome to the ward!" This man has apparently overheard Lance introduce himself at church and decided to pull our names and seal us! What a tender mercy it was to be able to see him 2 weeks after our wedding at church and have him recognize and remember us and the most important day of our lives.

The sealing was beautiful and having everyone there was absolutely amazing. We got ready to walk out and greet everyone for pictures. One of the first things I noticed was my brother was missing!! Apparently he had gone with his friend to buy a tie and in doing so completely missed the hour of pictures at the temple.

Our photographer James, and our videographer Matt, for whatever reason had a personality clash and began to taunt one another as they took Lance and my pictures around temple grounds. One shot Matt was determined to take and asked James to walk over and check out the shot's beauty. James responded with "that's okay (rolling his eyes) I'll take your word for it" and Matt sarcastically responded with "James c'mon! You don't want to miss this! You'll hurt my feelings if you don't come!" Lance and I just laughed at their game of cat and mouse.
We left the temple and headed down to the reception hall to help guide in the set-up. Numerous times Amie had to tell me to stop setting things up and go get ready for the Ring Ceremony.

 

All in all, our wedding was perfect.  I loved seeing my friends and family who traveled up to Utah.   I loved dancing and laughing and enjoying the day with my new family.  Thank you to everyone who made our wedding a dream come true.

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