It's finally time....

Russ and I spent all weekend cleaning our apartment, getting the car ready, and packing.....

Only about 20 hours and then...
We are off!!!

To the love of my life on his birthday...

Russell,
I just wanted to let you (and everyone else) know how much I love you. You are my love, my life, and my everything. You've always been there for me since the day we met and continue to be there for me no matter what happens. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't smile because of you, whether it was something you did or just your presence in my life and the love you give to me. I am happy because of you. Everything you do for me and for us gives me the happiness that I've always wanted in this life, and in the next. I am so very grateful for you and for your love. Thank you for everything you do everyday that makes my life so complete and wonderful!! I only hope that I can somehow show you how much I do love you and how grateful I really am.

I love you Russ!!

Happy Birthday!!!

Our "Wicked" weekend!!

Last Christmas my parents gave us a calendar that they had also given to my grandparents with pictures of our family for each month. As we skimmed through the calendar we found a paper taped to May inviting Russ and I to see the broadway musical Wicked with my parents and siblings at Capitol Theatre on May 1st! We were SO excited! especially because it was difficult to get tickets.

So, May 1st finally came and we had a blast!! Beforehand, we went to dinner at Chopstix in Farmington. I love Chinese food and I don't get it very often anymore because Russell doesn't like it very much; but he was a great sport and ate some anyways. It was fun to go out with my family again. Braxton also brought his girlfriend Ashleigh, who we all love so much because she is just the cutest, nicest girl you could know. Ash also speaks Mandarin Chinese fluently (she's been taking classes for years). Jaden and Kenna asked her to say something to one of the waitresses, so she asked for some chopsticks and had a small conversation with the waitress in mandarin. We were all very impressed and then had fun with it because after she was in the chinese mind-set, she was having a hard time with english, so she would just catch herself after starting to answer in Chinese. We had a good laugh.

On our way to Salt Lake Russ told me he needed to get into the "musical mood." So, instead of listening to classic rock like we normally do we put in Phantom of the Opera, which is my favorite book and musical. That's always fun because we sing along and Russ gets really into the part of the Phantom, sometimes to a ridiculous level.

I absolutely love seeing musicals! When we got in the theatre, over the stage there was a large mechanical dragon and a map of Oz with a glittering Emerald City in the center. I had read the book before but it has been a couple of years and I had forgotten most of the story. It was so good though! We all loved it so much, the actors were all wonderful and hilarious! At one point a mistake was made and Elphaba was struggling to stay in character. Most people have heard the song "Popular" and I have to admit when I had heard it before we saw the play, I hated it. It's annoying, that's the best I can describe it. While actually watching what is going on during the song I was laughing so hard, and so was the rest of the audience. Galinda was so ditzy and blonde. Well, during a break in the song Galinda uses her wand and tries to change Elphaba's dress into a ballgown. After a couple of very funny tries she gets frustrated and tosses her wand in the air behind her. During this performance the wand was thrown so high it got stuck in the rafters and never fell back down. The audience laughed so hard as both of the actors looked up at in the air confused and trying to keep in character. They almost stayed in character completely, but everyone could see Elphaba starting to laugh and trying so hard to keep it in. After the laughter died down (which took a good minute or two as the wand still never fell) they continued on with the scene and the song.

The whole entire play was amazing, we all loved it so much. I think Russ was the only one who had something he wanted to complain about. He thought the ending (and we're talking only one minute to a minute and a half) was too happy. I won't go too into detail there for anyone who doesn't know the story...

Anyways, long story short, we had a lot of fun with my family! Thanks Mom and Dad! We love you!

I just can't wait...

for VACATION!!!

only a month to go....