It's a Wonderful Film

(apparently my theme for the day is "bad puns instead of titles")

We watched It's a Wonderful Life. Kayla and Charne had never seen it. Mind blowing. Charne, fine. But Kayla grew up in America, and Minnesota at that! Goodness knows Minnesotans love their holidays.

After the movie Kayla said, "It was pretty good."

She was the only girl in the room who didn't sob uncontrollably during the film, in fact, she didn't cry at all.

It's a Wonderful Life is not only the most wonderful Christmas film in the world, though. It is also one of the most wonderful films in the history of wonderful films.

The only copy that we could find in the entire city of Missoula was 16 dollars. Very pricey for a film over 60 years old, and a holiday classic. We couldn't even find it at Wal-Mart!
We bought it though. We've been needing a copy and my family couldn't find theirs so we bought one to watch.

Totally worth it.

fontastic

Today I got new fonts. This is how they look.
I like them.

High Time for Pie Time

I am thankful for family.
I am thankful for friends.
I am thankful for pie.

Hope you all had a happy Thanksgiving Day!

(p.s. Chelsea and I made the following pies: 1 smooth pumpkin, 1 rustic pumpkin, 1 apple, 1 angel, 1 peach. Surprisingly the peach was the favorite of most... )

Thanksgivins

We are leaving today.
In two and a half hours.
To drive to Montana.

I've been preparing all week.
No, I haven't been catching up on homework, don't be silly!

I've been making a mental list of all the things to not forget.

Been prepping my stomach for more food than it's used to (quite a feat, it's used to a lot!)

Been burning and then decorating a slew of CDs to listen to in the car.

My computer is charging as we speak.

My mind is racing with road trip food that we can't forget to pick up.

ooooh, Beef Jerky! I want to eat you NOW!

Family, I will see you soon. Maybe you'd best start mentally preparing yourselves for us, too.

househousehouse

We had a busy weekend. We finally bought short nails and could put up pictures around the house, as well as hang our wedding quilt from grandma Marcie. (Good thing we have a quilt from Grandma Mary to snuggle with, our wall quilt is apparently too fragile!)

We also bought ourselves a little can of chalkboard paint, and painted a wall in our living room. It had barely dried before we colored all over it. We LOVE it. Sadly, all my pictures of it turned out blurry. They room was dark and I was having a hard time holding the camera still.

Our kitchen was finished a few weeks ago, but I’m finally posting some pictures.

So, this isn’t exactly extreme home makeover, but it’s starting to look like a pretty house, right.

We loooooove it.

These are some pictures from the living room.

Our living room also includes two bookcases. Isn't it funny? We have yet to really combine our books, and you can tell, my shelves are much more cluttered and messy.

Then, of course, our beautiful kitchen.

Look how clean and white!

We love to have couples over for dinner, too. Travis and I should be professional hosts, since we both get super excited and clean the house and cook tasty food.

Last night Travis made homemade fish sticks from Trout that Chris brought over, and mashed potatoes from real potatoes.

I made an Angel Pie (family favorite) and over half of it had disappeared before I remembered that I promised Grandma I’d take pictures of it.

Oops, sorry Grandma. I turned out perfect though. Each of us had two pieces and the pie was gone within an hour.

It was TASTY!

Okay, Truce

Since almost the beginning of our relationship Travis and I have had to instate a rule of truce.
When we first starting dating it was for things like belly-pie. (Everyone else is the world calls it a raspberry, I believe.)
Then we needed a truce for tickling.

Now that we're married we need truces for pinching, smacking, and biting. (all of these activities are participated in with playfulness, not with the aim of abuse).

We have a few rules for trucing:
First, a true is initiated by a pinky-swear.
Second, if a mutual truce is decided on then the truce last several hours. Usually the exact length of time is decided upon at truce time.
Third, if it is a forced truce it only lasts an hour. Forced truces happen when, for example, I am being tickled into insanity and I somehow get hold of his pinky with mine and yell "TICKLING TRUCE!"
Then he has to stop.
It works like a charm.
Unfortunately, Travis has gotten very good at not letting me get hold of his pinky with mine, so I usually have to fight him. Head butting and kicking are my main defense.
You'd probably be amazed how much energy we get out just sitting on the couch.

ignoring the warnings of generations before me

I cut my bangs.
I cut them myself.
I cut them too short.
I cut them crooked.
I cut my bangs with a pair of dull kitchen shears,
because it was spur of the moment
and I couldn't find any other scissors.
I cut them in the morning,
while getting ready for class.

Travis likes them.
I cut them at his urging.
They look like this:

Please take a moment to see how long my hair is.
If I were a mermaid in a disney movie, I could be covered without a seashell bra!

The QuestionTwo Questions

Since getting married I have found that people no longer ask me how I am.
They do not ask me about school. They do not ask me about work.
They ask me one of two questions:
1. How's married life?
or, with a slight twist at the end
2. How's married life treatin' ya?

Something about the pairing of words "treating you" is impossible for the seemingly hordes of people curious with married life's interaction with me. It must come out "treatin' ya"

So if you have the desire to ask me question one, please restrain yourself. I have a prepared statement.

Married life is wonderful, much better than being single. (haha) It's great, it's everything I hoped it would be. Thank you for asking.

If you have a desire to ask me question two, again, I already have a statement prepared.

Married life is very kind to me. It lets me out twice a day, and takes me on walks round the neighborhood. It keeps me well fed, well rested, and is slowly making me fatter. Thank you for asking.

diet

I want a book called:
"How to get skinny without changing your habits or diet, and without dangerous body-altering drugs or surgery."

Blast. I hate going to the doctor.
They make you stand on that scale and then they write down your weight...
If I get chubby, I blame being married.
That makes this alllll Travis's fault.

Lifebook

Facebook will suck away your life.
I try not to go on to facebook, but every once and a while it emails me a notification like this, "Some person you don't know commented on some one else's photo that you don't remember even looking at, let alone commenting on."
So then I have to get on facebook to see what picture that was. Usually it's a picture from like three years ago, of a person I haven't spoken to in two years.
Then, even though I don't care about that person, and forgot I even knew them, I find myself clicking through every single one of their bloody pictures. Then if I see that we have a mutual friend, I need to look through all their photos too for no specific reason.
I hate it.
I makes me bonkers.

I don't even want a facebook, but I'm afraid that if I quit it, I'll never talk to any of my MN friends again, especially if I lose my phone again.
That's how they get you!

Our day to day

Friday, I finally got a chance to see inside this beautiful building! After living in Utah for going on three years, I had only ever wandered the Salt Lake Temple's grounds.
The Christmas light display in the winter is wonderful (I cannot wait to go this year!), and the tours by sister missionaries are always so blasted sweet, but there's nothing like going inside.
Everything inside is beautifully and intricatly made and all by hand. No wonder it took them forty years to build it.
The spirit inside was so strong, and it was the perfect beginning to the perfect weekend.
After the temple, Travis and I went to Indian food and then to see Gentlemen Brocos. It was a pretty typical Jared Hess film, parts of it was super funny, parts were painful to watch, and parts were just plain gross. But it was pretty funny, definitely not my favorite, though.

Saturday it snowed, so we slept in, nice and snuggly, then Travis made me a warm tasty breakfast and we watch Harry Potters 3 & 4. We drove up to Sundance and bought Travis his Night Pass for snowboarding, and played a bit in the snow.
Then the Picthers took us out for tasty Peruvian dinner, and a live show! We saw Little Shop of Horrors, which was really well done, and super entertaining.

Today we went to church in the morning, finished our marathon by watching Harry Potter 5, took a nice long nap, played some Christmas carols on the guitar, and then had a party!
Not a real party, but we made a banana cake for our neighbors and new friends, since Susie stayed home sick and Cole said we couldn't make them dinner.
We stayed and talked for a long time, and it was a lot of fun. That banana cake is a win. Everyone love it, and no one has ever had banana cake before.
I'm disappointed though. At church Cole asked of I could spend the day tomorrow watching their chubby baby, since their normal sitter canceled last minute. I was psyched all afternoon.
But I guess when Cole got home Susie had already figured out a sitter.
Too bad.
I'll get that baby to love me somehow.
Good night family.
Good night friends.
Good night strangers who might for some reason read this blog.

I hope your weekend was as perfect as mine.

that video

that video I posted below was deleted, but it's still cool, so check it out at this link.

Toyland, Joyland

Watch this video before you read what I've written below.

HP "Create Amazing" - Director's Cut from Keith Loutit on Vimeo.

Those aren't toys! Whhhaaaat??!
They're real people, shot with a funky lens and it's blowing my mindgrapes!
Travis is going to make one.

Food Inc

Travis and I recently watched a film called Food Inc.
Here are some of the not-as-horrifying-as-the-rest-of-the-film-facts:

An average hamburger contains meat from 50-100 cows.

There are essentially only 13 slaughtering houses in America, so if one factory is affected by E-Coli or something else then the entire United States will indefinitely be exposed to it.

McDonalds is the largest consumer of Meat, Tomatoes, Chickens and many other products in the country, because they want all their food to taste exactly the same, they have to raise their products in exactly the same conditions. Aka, in a dark enclosed space, being fed ONLY corn and anti-biotics. Cattle are kept in rooms so small that they are ankle deep in manure from the moment they're born. Their coats are covered in manure, and when they go through the factories, our food is filled with their manure.

When the FDA or USDA tries to crack down on companies they are sued for libel, taken to court and inevitably told that they have no real authority.

After putting 1.5 million Mexican laborers out of work by cheapening the cost of corn, Meat companies actually advertise for themselves in Mexican newspapers and on the radio, and bus hundreds of workers a year to their factories. Because the workers are illegal immigrants they do not treat them with any civility, denying them such basic rights as drinking water, or safety regulations. Occasionally there are government raids, but the companies are never punished, only the workers.

Due to the crappy diet of everyone in America, type 2 diabetes, previously unheard of in children, is now almost as common among kids as adults.

This film is a must-see. For realsy. I'm still freaking out.

Here is the TRAILER.

Also, the Child Nutrient Act is being reinstated in this year. To vote for fresh vegetables, whole grains, and no soda pop in schools, sign this petition.

the friend maker strikes again!

new friends! new married friends! new married friends with a baby!

yay!

We made friends at church, and we like them very much. They're super cute and funny, and like the same things as us. (Uh-oh. Does this sound like dating to anyone else?)

At his family's Halloween party Daryl Lee told us, "No one tells you how much harder it is to court couples than a single person. You like the wife, he can't stand the husband and you have to start all over."

That's super funny too, because as soon as we got married we had this need for married friends. We still love our unmarried friends (nothing could diminish that love!) but there's something about inviting another family into your home that is really fun.

We invited two couples over after dinner today for dessert. One family had relatives in town, but the other family came over. Unfortunately, Travis and I got into a baking craze and made about 12 dozen cookies of various kinds, and it was all I could do to talk him out of brownies, too.

We talked and laughed and lost track of time, and oops, now the boys are late to their priesthood meeting. But it was really nice. We loooove the family ward, it's surprisingly diverse, and has YW/YM and everything, and a lot of people who are a lot like us.
Maybe Kaylie and LJ will even be in our ward, they live just a few blocks away, and we have pretty big ward boundaries for Provo.

Our new friends even borrowed some DVDs, now they'll have to come back. Muwahahaha!

Hide in fear, ye friendless masses, because you could be next!
The friend maker strikes again!

(p.s. Why hide in fear? We're lovely people and a swell couple. Come eat some tasty peanut butter cookies. And if you're allergic, we also have chocolate chip!)

Wishing for Winter

A wind has blown the rain away and blown the sky away and all the leaves away, and the trees stand. I think, I too, have known autumn too long.

e.e. cummings

November?

good walker

Yesterday my brother-in-law Chris told me a story.
While riding the bus home from class, he saw me sitting a few seats away.
I was wearing sunglasses, and obviously ignoring him. He tried to catch my attention.
He could not.
He glared at me with an angry face, only stoping himself from yelling out my name because the bus was crowded and it was rude.
He wondered why I was getting off at Wyview but figured that I had lived there before and was visiting friends or something.

Only after I got off the bus did he realize that the sunglassed girl was NOT me.

"How could you tell it wasn't me if she looked just like me?" I asked.
"She got off the bus," Chris said, "and I was like 'Becky is a much better walker than that girl.'"

YES! After years of walking into doors and falling down stairs, it's nice to think that I can be recognized by my walking skillz.

Major Frustration

I was a cocky eighteen year-old. I knew what I wanted, where I was going, what classes to take, and never had a doubt about my major.
My other friends took generals, experimented with different classes and slowly decided what they wanted from life.
Now most of them are on the right track to their ideal life.

I however skipped most of my generals, because I only wanted to take English classes.
Now my junior year in college, I have 18 GE creds to take, and I have changed my mind. Suddenly, I do not ever want to take another English class again, unless it's Children's Literature or poetry.
Dang it all!

Katie said, "You could do an advertising major, it's like 50 credits."
No Katie, it's like 36 credits and an internship.
It's like, my new major.

I am legitimately excited and happy to study communications, and I believe that I could totally get a job in advertising.
But here are some pros and cons:

PROS:
Could be completed in two or three semesters
Does not require a foreign language (Huzzah!)
I could easily work from home
I could easily work in New York (where we're planning on living for Grad School)
I could totally find work with a publishing house, and work with Children's Media or literature (Yippee!)
I could work with Travis.

CONS:
The College of Communications is on the opposite side of campus. (Freaking Brimhall Building, NO ONE LIKES YOU.)
Starting a new major is scary
Because I am no longer taking French, I might have to take *sobbing and fear* a math class!
Communications might be hard.
There are two tracks: Creative and Management. Creative is hard to get in to, but Management sounds boooring.

And to share with you, this is my favorite advertisement. I could make beautiful ads like this.
What it says literally is that you could find a beautiful asian wife. Underneath that it actually says "Are you a nasty fat lazy slob and pervert who could never find a girlfriend, let alone a wife, because you spend all your time playing WOW online? If so, send us your money, we'll send you a slave!"
It's all about changing the words up.
I could TOTALLY do that.

TRAVIS JUST INTENTIONALLY POKED ME IN THE EYE WITH HIS FINGER.

and electricity shooting through me

Lauren the twelve year old wrote some beautiful fan fiction under the secret name: BROKENFEATHERS.

We love Lauren.
She loved Lizzie McGuire.

Please read this beautiful story. Begin with Gordo's Summer, and then Confusion: PART 2.

Lovelovelove.
Please leave her some helpful comments.
:)


p.s. the kiss scene is the best part so far! Here's a sneak peak:

“What is it Gordo?” she wasn’t sounding nervous anymore, just worried about me.
“I, I was just noticing how amazingly attractive you are.” Stupid Gordo!

“What?” Lizzie said taken aback. “Gordo, hold on. I thought you said you didn’t like me that way.”

“Do you still like me?” Wait a minute! Just stop talking before you wreck a friendship, my mind screeched at me.

“Yeah, I do,” she said looking down and blushing.

“Well, see over the summer I…” I said trailing off. “Over the summer I found out I really do like you,” I said my secrecy coming undone.

She smiled and leaned in. Then she whispered, “let’s do something about it.” Our lips met and electricity shooting through me.

“Wow,” I breathed.

“Definitely wow,” she agreed.

closer to thirty than twenty

What an old man I've married!

Today is Travis' 26th birthday!

Unfortunatly my computer refuses to get the internet, even though I'm on campus, so I cannot upload any photos like I wanted.

But you know what he looks like, and if you don't, then just scroll down.

Happy Birthday Travis!
love always,
Your wife.

:)