My Little Brother

Presidents Day weekend my little brother Zachary flew in to visit us. He was so excited. Roy and him are like best friends. He had his first airplane ride on Thursday night from Salt Lake City to Las Vegas. I think it was good for him to kind of grow up and figure things out all by himself. I guess he did okay. He made it here and didn't end up on a wrong plane to NY. He was so excited to see us. Plus he thought he was so cool since he had just been on a plane!!! I had to work Friday day while he was here, but Roy and him went to some arcade on the strip and spent hours there. When I got home from work that evening we went to Freemont Street. This is like old school Las Vegas. If any of you have seen Honey I Blew Up the Baby you would recognize this place. The whole street is covered and they have a light show every hour. Zach thought this was pretty neat. Roya and Zach went bowling at midnight a couple times. (CRAZY) On Saturday we went out to lunch, took him to the dog park (of course we took Molly too) and went to the airport to pick up Macie. Zach immediatly fell in love with her and said he was going to sneak her onto the airplane with him and take her home. Obviously we didn't let that happen. He helped us get her settled in to her new home. Sunday he went to church with us. We didn't really do anything too exciting that day. Monday we went to Buffalo Bills and went on the tallest roller coaster in the western United States. We also took him to the outlet mall and he got a new walet since his was held together with NOTHING!!! We got him all packed up and ready to go home and took him to the airport that night. It was fun to have him visit and hopefully he will come again. We are not that exciting but we do live in an exciting place! (I guess) Since it was Valentines Day weekend I just wanted to thank Roy and Zach for eating almost all of my chocolate from my students so I didn't!!!

Our New Addition

We are excited to announce the newest member of our family. Macie flew in from Louisana and arrived at the McCarran Airport at about 7:30 tonight. We were so excited to pick her up that we showed up almost an hour early to the cargo pick up building. I looked in the travel cage that she came in and she was hiding in the back looking very frightened. We scooped her up and brought her home to meet her older sister Molly. At first Molly was a bit uncertain about the new puppy, but after a while all she wanted to do was play with her. Macie is pretty scared of Molly right now, but I am sure it won't be long before they won't be able to stop playing all day long. Molly has been wanting a new friend for some time now, we caught her putting her stuffed animals in the window to look out with her. We have been looking for a new puppy around Vegas and could not believe the very expensive prices. The cheapest dog we could find was 800 bucks! We gave up for sometime, but then I started looking online...which never really works out the way you want it to... long story short, Molly is very excited to have a friend now. Angie has been like a member of the paparazzi taking pictures of the dogs and I am sure there will be many more to follow.

One of those days

Every now and again I have days where everything is so routine and I have nothing to look forward to. Today was one of them. I was walking my students out to the bus stop after school thinking "here we go again, another week of the same old thing." I started wondering is this what my life is now? Am I done having fun? Is this what being grown up is all about? I decided to come home from school earlier than usual so I could see Roy since he has a late class. On my fifteen minute drive home I could not stop thinking about how routine my life was and why I was here. I was sitting at an intersection and this funny looking bus/van thing drives through it. I thought to myself "that looks funny, what does it say on the side?" It was painted in all sorts of weird colors but the bus had given me a message. It said "Life is about the journey" Before I could take a second look, it was gone. I then remembered President Monson's talk he gave last October about enjoying the journey and how I need to live in the moment of life now.

"Life is like a roll of toilet paper, the closer it gets to the end the faster it goes." -Andy Rooney

Great lesson

For all you teachers out there you will appreciate this moment I had today. I had planned to have the students make the geometrical shapes out of salt dough. They then would write the numbers of faces, edges and vertexes for each. I knew the kids would have fun and that it would be a really engaging lesson. (I had this idea at our professional development about engaging students last Friday) Anyways I thought to myself this morning, "man it would really be cool if I got my second evaluation done during this lesson today" Well, you guessed right. I didn't even say anything to my supervisor I was doing this great lesson and she showed up. She said the lesson was great and the students really did well with it. She even told my class they have an amazing teacher and to give me a round of applause!! So I am pretty sure I nailed my evaluation.

Weekend to Arizona

We spent the the long weekend in Arizona visiting Roy's friend Cody and his wife Melissa. They recently had a baby and we went to see him and catch up. Roy met Cody while he was on the golf team at UVSC. Of course they had to play golf. They had a lot of fun, Cody even helped Roy fix his swing. YAY!!! We had lots of fun and wish we lived closer to them. Molly had a blast. Cody and Melissa have two dogs. Molly got a long so well with them. In fact, we had to separate them once in a while to let them catch their breath.

The trip home was LONG. The day after we got back home from our Christmas break Molly had gotten an infection of some kind. We called our Vet back in Utah and she prescribed an antibiotic for her. We had her on it for 2 weeks and it was not getting better. Because of this infection she had, she omitted this terrible metallic smell. The reason this trip was so long was 6 hours in the car with this smell could have been enough to kill you.

We decided to take Molly into a Vet out here in Vegas. I asked around at my school to find a good one. Roy took her while I was at work. Poor Molly. She had the works done to her. Her infection was really bad, they cleaned her out (from the backside) shot her up with some direct antibiotics and then prescribed her pills as well. The Vet said that he had never smelled a smell that bad in his career. Of course Molly was so good, she let them do whatever they needed to do to her. I think she knew they were making her better. Roy said every time they brought her out a different person was carrying her because they wanted to hold the cute puppy. That very night she was feeling much better. She had a little twinkle in her eye and seemed happier. She has had so many baths this month because of her stench... she now has a new word in her vocabulary and she doesn't like it. BATH.

Molly has been such a good friend to have in our family.


Hoover Dam

They are building a new bridge at the dam to cross. It is absolutly amazing they way they are building it. It is going to be very tall. We tried to get some pictures of it.

Can I vent?

It seems that there is always something for me to be stressing about. When we first moved here I stressed about getting a teaching job. Then I got a teaching job and stressed about how to be a good teacher and keep on top of things. I am feeling much more comfortable in that area. Now within the last week both of our cars are having issues and Roy has still not found a job for the semester . Oh and I have had some kind of sinus cold for the last month that will not go away. Why does it seem that when one thing goes wrong everything else seems to go with it. Is there ever going to be a point in my life where things work out and I (little miss worry wort) won't stress?

What a trip!

We had the chance to go home for the holidays and we took full advantage of it. We were able to spend almost 2 weeks with our families and friends. Molly had surgery the Monday before Christmas. I think we all felt bad for her because she just about had the most presents under the tree. She recovered well and is doing great!!! Christmas was wonderful and New Years was one of the funniest nights of our lives. Christmas was pretty normal, we woke up early and opened presents at the Smith home then we drove to Lehi to visit the Bale family, unfortunately Aubri was sick and we weren't really able to see her. We went home to shower and get ready for the day and then Angie and I went to her parents house for some more presents. As tradition goes, we then began our snowy trip to Heber to see Angie's grandparents and extended family. The weather was pretty bad but luckily we all made it alive...even MaryAnne...lol. We all snacked and visited for a few hours and then decided to leave before it got too dark. Overall the day was very enjoyable.

New Years eve we actually went out. Usually we stay home and play games with friends. We headed up to First Night in SLC with our friends Ellie, Steve and their cute little baby Lilly. We ate dinner at the California Pizza Kitchen and then hung out with millions of people. It was a little chilly but we survived. The fireworks were fun to watch and we even got to have our first new years kiss. AHHH!!! Of course we have new years resolutions. We are both going to lose 25 pounds. NO GOLF UNTIL IT HAPPENS..... Wish us luck!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!