Pioneer Day

Friday, July 24th, was Pioneer Day in Utah. I love that Utah has a Pioneer Day because it is one extra holiday for those of us living in Utah. David was able to have the day off, so we had all day to lounge around the house and relax. We didn't really do much during the day other than watch movies - Cool Runnings, play games (David played with Legos forever in the afternoon), and read books. It was nice to have a day to relax. Then at night we were invited to go to the Salt Lake Bees Baseball game with my old roommate, Courtney; her boyfriend, Spencer; her brothers, Alex and Ryan; Alex's girlfriend, Morgan; and one of Ryan's friends. David and I had never been to a Salt Lake Bees game - they are just a minor league team - Utah doesn't have a major league team.

Before the game, we went out to dinner with Spencer and Courtney to a well known restaurant in the area called The Pie. It is a little pizza place right near the University of Utah campus. They have really good pizza. The best part was, the workers told us that since we had to wait so long for our pizza, we got a free pizza! We had the barbeque chicken pizza, which was delicious!

After dinner we headed to the game. We just bought general admission tickets, so we sat just behind the outfield on blankets. I actually enjoyed sitting out on blankets better than sitting in seats - probably because I find baseball boring so getting to lay down made it better. The opposing team cancelled the game due to illness so instead the Salt Lake Bees held a homerun derby and then an 18 and under all star game. The home run derby was fun. David brought his glove since we were behind the outfield and attempted to catch a few of the home runs. The winner of the derby was a 16 year old high school student from Las Vegas. He hit so many home runs. He was really good! And only 16! He beat all the Bees players that were in the home run derby! Apparently he is the best hitter in high school in the world right now; rumor has it, the boy hit a 560 foot home run in Florida.

The all star game was pretty lame - no one was really watching. We waited through it though for the best part of the night - Pioneer Day Fireworks! After the all star game, they let everyone go down on the field. We got to lay our blanket out in the outfield and watch the fireworks. It was so cool because we were really close to the fireworks. In fact, we could feel ashes falling on us during the show. The show was really good. I would even say it was the best fireworks show I have ever been to. They had a lot of cool fireworks. It was a lot of fun to get to go out with Courtney and her brothers and Spencer. We had a really good Pioneer Day. It will be sad when one day we don't live in Utah and will have to work through the 24th of July. :( Until then, Happy Pioneer Day!

Manti Miracle Pageant

The very last weekend in June, David and I decided we wanted to go to the Miracle Pageant down in Manti, UT.  Since my mom was in town we invited her.  We also invited David's sisters and mom as well as Adam and Carlee.  This was David, Carlee, and David's mom's first time to go to the pageant.  I hadn't been in about ten years so I really didn't remember much of the pageant.  David, his sisters - Kathryn and Kelli, his mom - Lauri, and I all drove down early to save seat for us.  Here is when we first arrived.  It was really, really bright outside.  How gorgeous is the Manti Temple in the background!

After we claimed our spot at the pageant, we walked down Main Street in Manti to find some dinner.  Here we are eating our hot dogs and hamburgers in the grass.  And of course David is making a face. :)

David and his sisters, waiting for the pageant to start.
David and I in front of the Manti Temple.  I forgot how big the Manti Temple is!  It really was so gorgeous.

Everyone at the pageant - minus Adam who took the picture and minus Jack who was running around pulling grass up.

One last shot of the temple in the sunlight.

The temple at night time - still waiting for the pageant to start.

For those who have never been, the Manti Pageant is a play that all the Mormons put on down in Manti.  The play is performed right in front of the temple, on the grassy hill just below the temple.  The play is about how the LDS church began and the early church members' journey across the plains on their way to Utah.  The play was good.  There were the occasional cheesy lines  - "the arrow...so swift" (as one guy said after he was shot by an arrow, right before he died) - but overall I enjoyed the play.  The end was really great with music playing from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.  The only drawback to the pageant was how late it was.  The pageant didn't even start until after 9:30 pm.  It ended around 11:15 pm and then we had to drive back to Provo.  After dropping David's sisters and mom off at their house, David and I finally got to my grandma's house around 2:15 am.  I was so tired the next day.  I hate staying up late.  Marriage is so nice - David and I go to bed at 10 pm.  We almost never stay up past midnight - not even on the weekends.  We enjoyed it but probably won't be seeing it again in the near future.  I think I can wait another ten years or so before I go back. :)

Attack of the Birds

On Monday morning, I decided to go for a long power walk down to the SugarHouse Park. It was beautiful and sunny outside. As I was walking through the park, I passed a tree with two birds in it. Suddenly, the birds started diving at me. One dove about a foot in front of me and the other started diving at my back. I am positive that if I had not started running, the one behind me would have ran into my back. Not to mention, they were scary black birds like the ones above. For the rest of my "walk" I was terrified that any of the other birds I saw were going to attack me, too. I guess I can now add "birds" to the very long list of animals that scare me. On a happier note, I walked 4 miles that morning. Go me!

Word to the Wise

When Papa Murphy's Pizza says "for best results cook one pizza at a time", they really do mean it.  David and I got pizzas for us and David's cousins the other night and me being the impatient person I am, ignored Papa Murphy's instructions and put one pizza on the middle rack and one on the top rack.  Let's just say that the pizza on the top rack cooked in like four minutes.  And by cooked, I mean the top of it burned and the bottom was still complete dough.  Oops.  Guess next time I'll follow the instructions more closely.

David's Third Birthday Celebration...

As I said before, we really celebrated David's birthday the WHOLE weekend.  For David's birthday I had given him a baseball glove as well as a coupon for breakfast at the Blue Plate Diner in Salt Lake.  The Diner is just down the street from his Aunt's house.  It is always full of people and has a sign that says it was voted the "Best Breakfast in Utah".  So Monday morning, Daniel, Heather, David, me, Kathryn, and Kelli all woke up and had breakfast at the diner.  I thought the food was good but nothing super amazing.  David got a black bean breakfast burrito with sausage that he really liked.  Just as always, the diner was packed with people.  There was even a man sitting at the table behind us with a pet parrot on his shoulder the whole time.  

After breakfast we hung out back at the house for a while.  We all went on the trampoline and played some basketball.   This mainly consisted of David and Daniel trying to beat each other in coming up with the craziest ways to dunk the basketball on the trampoline.  Next we decided to go hike up Ensign Peak.  It is located just north of the Salt Lake Temple and the capitol building.  Thankfully, it was a beautiful day!  The weather forecast predicted rain, but it was sunny and warm and beautiful.  Here are some pictures from the short hike:

The hike was only about a mile in all so not too difficult.  I had only ever hiked to the smaller lookout point, but this time we hiked the whole way up to the top point of Ensign Peak.  Word of advice - don't wear flip flops.  The hike wasn't that bad but it was steep enough that I got blisters on my toes from holding on to my flip flops so they wouldn't fall off.  All of David's siblings headed home after the hike so David and I decided to go to the Salt Lake Country Club for a swim.  This was our first swim of the season.  haha.  We miss our days at King Henry - lying out at the pool every single Saturday.  It was nice to lay out at the pool.  We even got to order sandwiches and drinks by the pool.  After being at the pool for a couple of hours we went home and played some catch with David's new glove.  That was about the end of David's Birthday celebrations.  Here is a picture of us- tired and exhausted from a day in the sun:

It was a great birthday celebration.  I can't believe David is 25 years old!  He is such an amazing guy.  He always makes me laugh and always makes me feel so special.  I love him so much!  Happy Birthday David!

David's Birthday Celebration Continued...

On Sunday, May 24th, we invited all of David's family to come up to Salt Lake.  Since his cousins were out of town and since Monday was Memorial Day, we had Daniel, Heather, Kathryn, and Kelli sleep over.  Everyone came up in the evening.  Just as David wanted, rather than cake for his birthday, I made hot fudge peanut butter brownie sundaes.  We sang Happy Birthday and then opened presents.  (Sorry I don't have any pictures.  I try to but then forget.  His mom has some so maybe I'll post some later when I get them from her).  

Over the past few months David kept saying he wanted a baseball glove.  Of course, he told me that I wasn't allowed to buy it myself because I know nothing about baseball.  Very true.  I must say, though, I was very proud of the glove I picked out.  It was a super nice glove but I bought at this store that sells broken in gloves so it is already broken in for him.  (Apparently that is a good thing.)  Also, since it was broken in I got it at a much better price than if I bought it new.  Go me!  Here is David with his glove.  When he opened it, he was so surprised!  He didn't think I was going to get him a glove.  He loved it, though!  Yay!

After opening presents, the whole family played a game of Clue.  Congratulations to Kathryn and Kelli - the winning team.  David's parents left after that to go back home.  We all went down to the basketball court and played some Knockout.  I completely suck at Knockout but it was a lot of fun.  Kathryn was very impressive and made it to the final two players almost every single round.  After playing around for a while, we all went and played Rock Band/Guitar Hero for a while.  We ended up staying up until like 1 am.  How sad is it that that is the latest I have stayed up in a really long time?  I am usually in bed at 10 pm - even on weekends!  It was a lot of fun to have everyone over to celebrate David's birthday.  Thanks Driggs Family!!

David's 25th Birthday Weekend

David's birthday was on May 26th.  We decided to celebrate his birthday all weekend long, though, since he would be working on his actual birthday. It began on Saturday, May 23rd.  David's Aunt and Uncle and cousins left that day to go to France for the week.  That meant David and I got the whole house to ourselves!  To begin David's birthday celebration we decided to go to a dinner and movie.  We haven't gone out on a date in so long it feels like so we were both excited.  

Before we left, I gave David his first birthday present.  Let me begin by telling you that a week ago or so, David informed me that for my birthday we could go to the Killers concert that was coming to Salt Lake.  I'm not sure if it is really a present for me or for him.  haha.  Either way is fine.  So I thought since we want to go to the concert, and David doesn't have very many Killers songs, I bought him a bunch of Killers songs on iTunes and burned him a Killers Mix CD.

We decided to go see "Terminator Salvation." David was dying to see it; however, he read some review before we went and was disappointed that it got bad reviews.  This may have helped us, though, because we both like the movie.  I thought it was good.  I jumped a million times during it.  It wasn't absolutely amazing, but I didn't feel as though I had wasted my money.  

After the movie, we used a gift card David's Aunt and Uncle gave us and went to dinner at the Cheesecake Factory.  I hadn't been there since high school.  It was so delicious.  Sadly, by the time my meal came out, I was stuffed from our calamari and bread that I barely had two bites.  We did take home a piece of cheesecake.  It was the Chocolate Pecan Turtle something cheesecake and it was AMAZING.  I highly recommend it.  When we got home we decided to watch "Jurassic Park 2" in the theater room.  David fell asleep, though, and I got scared from watching it so I turned it off after about 45 minutes and went to bed.  Let me tell you - it gets scary being in a giant house with tons of windows watching people get eaten by dinosaurs all by yourself.  So that was the end of David's birthday celebration #1.