Life Updates

You could consider this post similar to one of those Christmas letters you get in the mail...this one doesn't come with any pictures of us, but I figured it's time to give friends an update on life for us. I know there are some friends and family who know a lot about our lives, and some are fellow friends from facebook who are past roommates, high school friends etc. So here's the basic rundown on each of us:

Mark is now considered a junior at Utah Valley University but will have junior status for a while still. He has been working at Insidesales.com for 2 1/2 years now and is a product manager. Our original plan a year ago was to have him stop working and go to school full time this fall. But due to some positive changes at work (ie a raise) we decided it would be worth it to have him continue to work full time and do night classes until he was no longer able to. From the looks of it, he should be able to finish as a night school student no problem with an estimated graduation date of April/August 2015.

Although his schedule is less than ideal for us and for the company he works for, they have been awesome and supportive in his decision. He goes to work from 6:30-3:30 on Mondays and Wednesdays and then has class from 4-5. It's an early morning, but then he's home by 5:30. On Tuesdays he works a normal schedule and has one evening class from 5:30-6:45. Those days he gets home just in time to see me head off to my office for my evening on-duty time. Thursdays he works from 8-6 with a 2 hour "lunch break" for a 1 credit seminar class required for graduation. It sounds fairly pointless for anyone who already knows what they want to do for their career like Mark, but they somehow believe this 1 credit is crucial to graduation. He has kept busy for sure with 10 credits this semester, but it is surprisingly doable and I get more time with him than I thought I would, which is awesome.

As mentioned in a previous post, I am in my 2nd year as a hall advisor at BYU. Our new apartment is almost double the size of the previous building we were in before. So needless to say, I have more to clean and it can get extra quiet/lonely at times with Mark gone all day. There are seriously days where I do not talk to a single person unless I happen to be in my office and someone comes by. While there are difficult moments and residents from time to time, I have some great co-workers and managers to work with that make it fun. Plus it's quite fascinating to see freshman go through the same social and educational phases each year.

I have also been kept busy working on my class through UW-La Crosse. The class I'm enrolled in is "Helping Children Cope with Grief and Loss". I wouldn't say the class is depressing, but when you're reading books called "Mourning Children, Children Mourning" and "Private Worlds of Dying Children" it sheds quite a bit of light into the darker and sadder side of the children that Child Life Specialists serve and work with. With it costing us $1200 for the 2-credit class (out of state tuition costs), I am not sure if I will enroll in their 2nd course offered in the Winter. Because of my human development background, I only need to take the class I'm currently enrolled in before I am eligible to apply for an internship and ultimately sit for the national certification exam. While it sounds pretty easy and simple, there are a few bumps in the road that we'll have to figure out as time goes by. For now, it's fun to be "in school". I forget how much I love learning--especially in the field of child development/psychology.

That basically sums life up for us. Now that summer is over, most of our big adventures are over until next summer (7 months to go). We are toying with the idea of going on another cruise to the Bahamas, or perhaps the Caribbean. For now though, we'll be enjoying less exotic adventures such as the dollar movie theater, occasional restaurant and evening walks together.

Utah State Fair

The annual Utah State Fair was this past month. As it has been another bucket list item for us (yes, we lead such adventurous lives) we decided to go on the last weekend. I think I remembered the fair being much different than this one. Back in 2007, Mark and I went to the Ventura County Fair and I don't remember it being so crowded. That said, we picked perhaps the worst weekend to go since it was not only closing weekend, but the same night as the BYU vs University of Utah game. I can stand crowded places for a while, but soon my patience and interest in staying wears thin. Plus, fairs always bring ahem...very classy people which can bring about entertainment to an extent.
They had a tractor exhibition area. Sadly you couldn't cross the rope to get pictures on them.

We also visited the livestock areas. Surprisingly, the sheep and goat areas didn't smell that bad. It was the chicken and cow areas that were almost unbearable. This is a blue ribbon chicken.....obviously. 

 We found a few picture boards and couldn't resist getting a "family" picture. I knew Mark always would have looked great as a redhead. And doesn't the neighborhood city councilman look great with a pitchfork? I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be carrying back milk from milking the cows or getting water from the stream. Either way, I have some awesome legs.

 My innocence was lost when I, along with my sister-in-law, realized that while we were in the goat arena, the announcement they made for showing the goats was for people to buy them to kill them- not as pets. And the "packer"...well let's just say I realized that he didn't just fit them neatly into crates into a big truck. So after we viewed the displays of sweet animals who were about to be auctioned off for killing, we decided to enjoy some roasted corn. (Though I later enjoyed a pulled pork sandwich.) Seriously, Mark has converted me to corn on the cob. It's messy and there's no polite way to really eat it, but that has to be one of my favorite parts of summer: corn on the cob slathered in butter with some seasoning salt, garlic or other savory flavorings.

 After enjoying some fair food, we decided to wait a while before hitting up any rides. We saw this awesome juggler from Oregon. He juggled hakysacs, baseballs, and even did one or two little magic tricks. His show was pretty impressive.

 After the juggler, we meandered over and found the Lemur display. If you sanitized your hands, they actually let you pet one under the supervision of their "friendly" staff. This little guy here was kind of crazy. He kept hopping back and forth on the cage, perhaps a little unsure of the strange looking humans staring back at him.

 I got this shot while we were waiting in line for the scrambler ride. Rides are overpriced at fairs to say the least, and Mark's siblings didn't want to go on any rides so we picked one before we left. This Ferris wheel actually was pretty safe with the seats being more of a booth style rather than a ski lift type chair. Ferris wheels scare me, but I felt that it wasn't a true fair montage without the Ferris wheel and a nearby popcorn booth in the picture.

 On the way back, our car hit another milestone in life. To celebrate us paying off our loan and finally getting the title in the mail, it hit 115,000 miles. It's been a good little car and I'm almost certain after the past 6 months it could drive from here and the airport/Salt Lake area on autopilot.

Cake Decorating

I am not crafty. My creative bouts come rarely and are usually less than impressive. Like most people, I envision that the projects I take on will turn out much more grand and amazing than the real product. Regardless, I decided to try my hand at cake decorating. 2 years ago for Christmas, my mother in law gave me a cake decorating kit. I finally managed to find a class segment that would work with my work schedule. The Cake Decorating Basics 1 class was offered at Michael's just a few minutes from our house. So for 4 Fridays, I left Mark at home for 2 hours and went to learn.
I really enjoyed the classes. There are actually "Wilton Certified" teachers who teach the course. My teacher Korin was fabulous. She is actually a pastry chef by trade and a very talented cake maker. There were a few tricks I finally learned that help with baking and decorating cakes I never knew such as how to smooth a cake after a layer has dried, icing consistency, and finally converting to what my grandma always told me during cake mishaps: use parchment paper so the cake comes out nice. (I have had more split cakes than I care to confess to.)
The week before our final cake assignment was Mark's birthday. So I tried my hand at using different tips and the gel outline we learned. If you don't have a fancy pan, you can essentially trace any shape/design you want and fill it in. For Mark's cake I did a duck since we're borderline duck obsessive.

 For a first timer, I was proud of myself the way it turned out. Sure it wasn't a "perfect" duck, but you at least knew what it was. And it was much cheaper than buying the $15-$20 duck pan from Amazon.

 For the final cake class, we had to come prepared to decorate our own cake using the skills we had learned. The week before was a fairly successful first game of football season for BYU fans (though soon to be crushed by two horrible games we won't go into here). So rather than make some fancy flower filled cake that is not my personality, I decided to try making a football field cake. My teacher gave me the idea for the green shag around the edge. I'm glad I actually forgot that I wanted to do the whole cake green shag. My hand would have been cramping and I don't know that the yard lines would have shown up as well.

By the time I finished the cake, Mark and I were pretty sick of cake/frosting. So we gladly shared it with my family for the Labor Day holiday weekend. Seriously, I went through 3 bags of powdered sugar, and a whole can of crisco. Bleh! Hopefully my love for buttercream frosting was only temporarily killed.
I think I might skip the flower design class and look into their basic fondant class. But between work and school, life keeps me pretty busy. (More on that later!)