This and That

well...life around here hasn't been super exciting lately but I thought I would just write a little something about this weekend. Houston had off the WHOLE weekend - friday, saturday, and sunday! if anybody knows about being a manager at wal-mart, you know that is just amazing! the down side is that today he just started working over nights (he left me 2 hours ago). But, the weekend was fun!

Friday night we went to the dollar theater with our friends Tyson and Shelise. We saw What Happens in Vegas, when I saw the previews for it originally I didn't think it looked that great but it was actually pretty cute. It turned out to be a lot more "romantic-y" than I expected. Then we went out to dinner at Maria Bonita. For months now Tyson and Shelise have been telling us about how amazing this place is and we FINALLY got a chance to go and boy were they right!! I always get so down and out when I want mexican food, because NOTHING around here compares to what we have back home. People around here go 'gaga' for Los Hermanos - but honestly it really isn't that good. Maria Bonita is where it's at!! Houston and I shared a plate of fajitas and had enough left overs to last us for days. Ok, I think that's enough raving about mexican food, I was just really really excited! If you want to check it out, it's a little bitty restaurant on 8th North in Orem.

Saturday, Houston was supposed to help some people in the ward move but that didn't work out too well. oops! But, after the "moving" we had a mini barbeque/get together on our street with some of our neighbors/ward members. There is a little grassy area by the mail boxes on our street and one of our neighbors pulled out his grill and we set up a bunch of chairs and just hung out for a few hours. It was really neat. We have been in our ward for well over a year now and I just recently started to feel like I was making some good friends. So, it was really fun to be able to spend time with people in the ward and get to know some people better. Now I have more friends, even better! :) After the barbeque, Houston's parents came into town! It's a rare occasion that Houston and I get to spend time with his parents, just us 4, and we had a really good time! We took them to our new favorite restaurant (yes we ate at Maria Bonita 2 nights in a row...it's that good) then we went and saw Kung Fu Panda. The movie was really cute, I had heard good things about it but the first bit of the movie I was not too impressed with, so I was glad when it started to get more interesting, and the end was fun. "skadoosh!" The Panda only says that once the whole movie but it's so random and funny that it definitely sticks with ya!! After the movies we met up with Forrest and had ice cream at Sub Zero (if you've never heard of it...see below!)

Sunday Houston and I both gave talks in church. I started feeling sick about it in the middle of Kung Fu Panda and never felt better until about 2 minutes into my talk. My stomach hurt, my heart was racing, I had to take deep breaths, and it just kept getting worse!! I don't know why my body whacks out on me like that. It's not like deep down inside I'm super duper nervous! I've had to speak in front of people many times and it isn't like I think I'm going to mess up or anything. I guess the more time I have to think about it the more time my body has to involuntarily go crazy! But, all in all it was a really fun experience. Houston and I wrote our talks on Friday night and it was a really great opportunity to talk about our own spiritual experiences and thoughts; it was just really fun and something out of the ordinary. In our ward the bishopric doesn't ever give out topics. They basically say choose an article from a fairly recent General Conference or talk about something you feel strongly about/have been studying on your own. I don't know about you, but I think it is harder to come up with your own topic than to just be given one! Since it will be three years since I was baptized (on Wednesday) Houston thought I should share my conversion story. I thought it was a little bit of a cop out, but Tyson and Shelise thought it was a good idea too so I went with it. I talked about my conversion story and tied it into the importance of choosing to be happy through adversity. Houston talked about the restoration of the gospel and I really thought his talk was great!! He surprises me so much sometimes - he doesn't talk about his spirituality very often, but when he does it is always something incredibly profound, or something I had never thought of. He used a lot of Oliver Cowdery's writings (in Joseph Smith History) to give the Restoration a more personal feel. Oliver Cowdery's writings are beautiful and really portray the humanity of what was happening, these were real men having extraordinary experiences. Pretty cool!

Well for having a pretty chill weekend, I ended up writing a ton! Sorry about all the wordage and no pictures. I always think blog posts are kind of boring without pictures...but I didn't take any all weekend because Houston left my camera in his car! Oh well! I think I will leave you with some pictures of my baptism, since it is my three year "anniversary" soon :)

me and Julie - she flew all the way up to Utah for my baptism and gave a beautiful talk. I wish I had a copy of it.All of the girls from the Sugar Land 1st Ward who came. Halie and Kylie even sang a duet which was really sweet of them, and of course it sounded gorgeous! Me and my hubs - who wasn't my hubs back then, or even my boyfriend for that matter! :)me and the missionaries! When I moved to Utah I had to take the discussions all over again, so the two on the far left are the missionaries I met with in Provo. Then the other three were missionaries who all taught me back in Texas! All three of them got home from their missions a few weeks before my baptism.