DELAYED-- our new favorite word.

Holy. Worst. Experience. Flying. Ever.

We got to the SLC Airport 2 1/2 hours early because there was a storm coming in and we wanted Alene (who was SO nice to drive us to the airport) to be able to get back to Provo before it hit. (not to mention get back in time to watch the Las Vegas Bowl Game)

Our plane was delayed in getting there. Of course. But it eventually came and we only boarded 15 minutes late. We were thinking "great! we will still be able to make our connecting flight in Las Vegas!" We taxied out to the run way..... then sat there for an hour. Yes, delayed 1 hour. The storm just kept getting worse and they had to de-ice the plane for a while. Just when we thought we would be stuck there all night, they were able to take off. We were starting to get a little nervous about making our connecting flight. We talked to a flight attendant about it but he was not helpful, even a little bit RUDE.

(Sub plot: Brian was by the window and I was in the middle. Our flight was full and an older woman sat next to me who smelled r e a l l y w e i r d. On top of that, she ordered coffee, which I cannot abide the smell of. Not a good combination...)

Due to adverse weather conditions, our 1-hour flight took 2 hours. We had long since given up hope of making our connecting flight. Also due to adverse weather conditions, our flight was more like a roller coaster/elevator on steroids. I am not usually prone to motion sickness, but combined with all the lovely odors coming from the woman next to me, I was rather ill. I will spare you the details, but I will say that I hope I never have to use the little white bags in the seat-back pockets again.

But wait. The drama is not over! We landed in Vegas. If you were watching the Las Vegas Bowl Game BYU vs. Oregon State, you know that Vegas was experiencing winds upwards of 60 mph. Apparently winds like that make it hard to fly airplanes, so the Vegas airport only had 1 runway open. The place was mass chaos. Every flight was delayed. We had completely missed our flight to Pheonix, but after a lot of talking and negotiating, we were finally able to get stand-by tickets on a later flight, that also got delayed.

I still wasn't feeling well but sweet Brian braved the mobs and bought me over-priced food and very over-priced motion sickness medicine (the drowsy kind), which knocked me out until we arrived in Pheonix at 11:15 pm (3 hours after we should have been there). I hope I am worth it.

We got to the baggage claim and couldn't find any information about our flight. Finally, an announcement came on: "Passengers of flight 3926, your baggage has been delayed. Thank you for your patience."

By the time we got our baggage it was midnight. My poor grandparents who were picking us up! We are so grateful that they were willing to come get us!

We are just glad that we've finally made it to Tucson. It was a rough trip-- and it's debatable if it would have been faster to drive or not-- but I'm just glad we're here!

Birthday Bash

It was my birthday on Saturday! Brian was the best-- he did an hour and a half of dishes for me! He also surprised me with a book-- "Peter and the Sword of Mercy." It's the 4th book in a series... and until recently I thought that the series was a trilogy! I am excited to read it on our flight (we are actually in the airport right now, 1 hour to go before our flight leaves).

We didn't eat breakfast because we went to Tucanos Brazilian Grill for lunch. We ONLY go there when one of us has a free birthday meal, and we only go for lunch, because it's cheaper for the person who has to pay for their meal. Yay for being poor students! But Tucanos is amazing. There's a buffet-style salad and pasta bar that you visit as many times as you want and then waiters come around with about 10 different kinds of meats (and pineapple) grilled on an open flame. My favorite is the pineapple. There is a cylinder on each table that has red and green on the ends and that's how you show the waiters that you want more grilled meats or if you want them to stop bringing them. So towards the end of the meal, Brian and I put it on the red side, but whenever we saw the pineapple coming, we would switch it to green. The waiter started making fun of us! (We didn't even need to eat dinner that night, we ate so much! I'm sure that wasn't very healthy to gorge ourselves that way, but it was SO good!)

After Tucanos we did laundry.... SO glamorous.....

But then we went to Salt Lake for the Eclipse Christmas Concert. If you've never heard of this group, go here and listen to "We 3 Kings." They are such a fun group to see in concert! Brian even bought me 2 of their CDs!

So now I'm officially 23.... I need to remember that, I keep forgetting how old I am because I don't tell my students my age. They spend all year guessing, then I tell them on the last day. But every once in a while I have to stop and think wait, how old am I?

I am excited to see what will happen in this next year of my life. There will be a lot of big decisions to make and a lot of changes, with Brian finishing at BYU and starting Medical School. We will probably make the choice of where we are going in March, move out of Provo in July, and Brian will start school again in August. Hopefully I will be teaching.... but who knows? It will be interesting to see where we are a year from right now. This year will definitely be an adventure!

Dear Santa,

Macy's has partnered with the Make a Wish Foundation to donate $1 to them for every letter to Santa that they receive. So my class wrote letters to Santa Clause this week. Here are some of my favorites:

Thank you for the stuff you gave me last year. I hope I will have fun like last year. I rilly want to see a rain deer.

Nevermind the ear piercing from the email. I got it for my birthday. But I would like earrings now like pink blue green black white.

Do you get presents? I hope you have a WONDERFUL Christmas. I want books.

I want a family trip to Californya.

Do you like to go golfing. Have you gone of vacation to Hawaii. How many elfs do you have. How many children are there in the world.

Thank you for reading my other letter that I wrote. My sister gets to be one of your elfs in a play.

Can I have a elf for Christmas? Plese I will triy to be good a lot! I ascked you last yer! I mustf bin bad. sory.

I just want to say thank you for all the toys you have gave me the last few years and especially my baby alive. Merry Christmas

You are the nicest person in the world. I know Rosey and Buger, they are nice elfs and they always come to my house. how are you and mrs. clause. I’ve been having fun.


Apparently I need to teach them how to use question marks.