Furniture and Football Frenzy

Beckers said it was my turn to write the blog...This week we bought some furniture and we went to the BYU game.

Ok, in reality it really was more exciting than that...We bought our new furniture at the highly exclusive and rare Ivory Homes used furniture sale. Apparently it only happens every few years and it's only available to employees and one guest. Just in case you're wondering, I'm the employee, Beck was my guest. We lucked out with the timing of the sales (being shortly after I started) and got some smokin' deals on our furniture. As you can see, we're now the proud owners of several brand new used pieces of furniture: A dresser & nightstand, a hot chocolate table, a nightstand, a two drawer thing, and a headboard/footboard for our bed. Not a bad haul for the $$ we spent. After 4-5 tries we even got it all to fit into our little apartment and still have room to walk around.

The BYU game was reminiscent of the last football game that Beck and I attended together; football, fans, rain, and another "w" for the win column. I attached a photo so you can see the similarities (one obvious difference is that we were a little more prepared this year!). Thanks to Dave who hooked us up with the tickets!

Our favorite primary moment today came during sharing time. A member of the primary presidency asked, "Why do missionaries want to serve?" An enthusiastic sunbeam raised his hand and responded, "so they can have fun, so we can be nice to our families, and so we can go home safe and not fall off."

Back to the Bay...for the weekend

Last weekend Nate and I flew out to Oakland / Palo Alto for Laura and Jonathan's wedding. We stayed with Andrew and Jess Allen, Nate's and my former roommates, respectively. On Friday night, we acted like local Palo Alto-ans and went to Pluto's for dinner (a popular salad place where you get to choose 7 toppings) and to the Peninsula Creamery for Mint Oreo shakes. Yum.
We spent most of Saturday participating in wedding festivities - the sealing at the Oakland temple, the luncheon, and the reception in Laura's parents' backyard. We even got out of our shells a little bit and spent some time on the dance floor. I know - me dancing creates a picture of awkwardness, but it was actually really fun. Here are a few pictures from the temple - it was a really clear day so you could see all the way across the bay to San Francisco (which is somewhat rare):

In between the luncheon and reception, Jess and Andrew came and met us, and we went on an adventure to Mount Diablo. We basically just drove up the mountain until the point where they made you pay, then stopped and walked around for a little bit. The boys were feeling bored / adventurous and decided to climb up a rock while Jess and I watched them (and unsuccessfully attempted to talk some sense into them) from the car. Here they are climbing up the rock. Notice the metal mesh-y looking thing - Andrew climbed up that at one point.

Overall it was a fun weekend being able to be there with Laura and Jonathan (who was unable to pass up the opportunity to give his famous chicken-wing-hug), catching up with old friends, and hanging out with Andrew and Jess. It did make me miss living in Palo Alto though!

Labor Day Trek

Growing up, Labor Day to me always symbolized the end of summer - the end of the lazy no-school days, the end of enjoyable swimming (i.e. when it was warm enough you weren't numb), the end of nights spent outside when it was light and warm even later. It was always a little sad when Labor Day came, and I felt like I had to take advantage of this one last day of freedom before school started. Our family would always go with the Clasons, Bairds, and Woodleys up to a river near Applegate Lake in Oregon...I can't remember the name of it though...it will probably come to me at a totally random time. Anyway, we would go up and have a picnic and swim in the river, and it was always lots of fun. Even though I don't get a months-long summer break anymore, Labor Day still makes me a little sad to give up the opportunities to be outside that you have during the summer.

This year Nate and I kept trying to think of something fun we could do on Labor Day, but we had a hard time. We finally decided late the night before to go on a hike. We went up Big Cottonwood Canyon and hiked up to Lake Blanche (and Lake Lillian...and one other one I don't remember the name of). It was about 3 miles each way, and pretty steep (at least by my out-of-shape standards). It was fun though - we were really hot and tired by the time we got done, and it felt so good to dip our feet in the creek at the end. But it was a really pretty canyon and the view from the top was great! It was a good way to sneak in one last summer day before fall comes.