Let's Be Honest

The real reason I haven't been posting (or posting anything real) much because I have had only one thing on my mind as of late and it wasn't really a subject I wanted to share with the world. As most of you know, Chris graduated in May in Landscape Architecture and Environmental Planning. Finding a job has been tough.

Plain.
old.
no.
fun.

After about a month of rejections (about 5-10 a day) Chris decided to give it one more shot. (Now you have to understand here: Chris had NO job once school let out because during school he was a teacher's assistant so we needed something quick.) He applied to an international company hiring in the middle east, specifically the Kingdom of Bahrain. At first I was like, "Yeah, okay, apply for a job in Bahrain or whatever. It is not like we are going to ever move there!" Then I started to really consider it when the company was actually considering Chris. We did a lot of thinking and praying, talking and fasting, back and forth-ing. Right around the same time my brother Brett offered Chris a job at the family business. Now things were heating up. We had to make a decision. Chris and I both felt that Bahrain was the right thing for our family. We were so excited and started dreaming of our life abroad. When they finally offered Chris the job we were ecstatic. We both have never wanted something so bad. This was the biggest decision, since marriage, that either of us had ever had to pray over. We felt everything was falling into place. Then the contract arrived. The company was not willing to pay more than they would pay a middle eastern worker which would definately not support our family. Chris was very disappointed and had to turn it down. Why then, did we both feel it was the right choice? After months of stress, wondering, hoping, praying...we were left broken hearted. I told Chris we had one day to be angry about it and then we are moving on. We came to the conclusion that maybe the reason we felt it was right was because if we hadn't put all our effort into getting the job we would have always wondered, "what if?" Now we can move to Idaho, moving forward with no regrets. Knowing that we gave it our all.
So...Chris has been living and working in Idaho (and loving it!) for the past month or so and I have been here trying to adjust to single motherhood, pack, and find a place to live 135 miles away. It has been a little hectic around here. In fact I have had this post for about two weeks with no time to finish it up. Well its time because we are moving in two days to little, old Heyburn, Idaho. I mean, I don't even know if they have internet there! =)

Memories, Sweet Memories

I have been wanting to post this for awhile now but I keep forgetting. My good friend and college roommate for two years made a list of fun things we did so we could always remember the good times had. This was my second year at BYU-Idaho with roommates Kyla, Courtnie, Weezie, Noss, and Lindsay (wasn't that her name? She was engaged so we hardly ever saw her. And she was much too mature to participate in our ridiculousness.)

• John threw a big ball at Emily while she was eating a cookie so she choked on it
• Playing blind and not realizing people were watching us at our window...for several minutes, while we "watched" TV and had a blind dance party
• Noss standing on the couch and Kyla going to pick her up but then Noss fell on her and as Kyla was yelling Noss' belly muted her and instead made a zerbet/zerbert/raspberry sound
• Emily was trying to get her cookies down and they fell all over the counter then the floor and she was pretending to have a break down but then ended up really crying and went to the back leaving all the rest of us speechless...sort of.
• The blackout of 2004 when we all screamed as soon as the lights went out then stopped when they came on and then started when they went out again.
• Naming the fire works and then teaching them to roommates...
• Throwing the hard boiled eggs off the balcony trying to make it to the dumpster
• Throwing the math textbook off the balcony and trying to make it into Kyla's laundry basket
• The Ballympics- Seth's Seal, Martin's balancing on all fours, John's flying out the door
• Catching the ball with: two fingers, Tarzan hands, elbows, heads--Clark rolling the ball up Noss' body with his head
• Courtnie's 80's birthday party with Scott dancing to "867-5309" and pulling toilet paper out of his pockets that had a birthday message on it
• Weezie's "2 2" birthday party with the boys doing things of "2" like Austin spinning 22 times around a bat
• The "bad weekend" without the Pirate flag when all went wrong: couples breaking up and some couples on the verge of breaking up
• Noss and Courtnie's 16 hour date
• Having our couches flipped three times by different people and us taking pictures of it because we were so excited
• The prank war that never really happened because we took out all their lightbulbs and they didn't do anything back.
• Adam- inviting himself to things, staying past curfew, knocking that horrible loud rapid knock, hiding in the back sometimes when he'd knock. Kyla dumping him and him not coming back til the day before we left and then getting him to dance behind Weezie while whe sang like William Hung to "She Bangs"
• Eating sardines with Seth
• Playing steamroller lat one night and making it a difficult obstacle course by bouncing up and down for the next roller.
• Odd Talent Show for FHE
• Paper bag game showdown between Courtnie, Weezie, and Shaun
• The Stinky-but-delicious Pot Roast which made our apartment smell like urine/vomit/diarrhea all day but tasted so good when we ate it
• Singing goodnight with the guitar over the phone to boys in our ward
• Making farting/burping noises over the phone to boys in our ward
• Xandadu- nothing more needs to be said about this one
• Michael Jackson- learning "Thriller", watching "The Way You Make Me Feel" and concentrating on the beginning whe he yells "Hey!"; "You were scared" "Nah, I'm enjoying

• Kyla kissing the Chief of Police at McDonald’s…twice because the first picture didn’t take
• Going to Outback to get just cheesy fries as our meal
• Fat girl flipping us off on our way to DairyQueen
• Cupcake race to see who could make it the fastest also competing for accuracy, style and teamwork
• The Brownie race that started the cupcake race
• Michael Jackson- learning “Thriller”, watching “The Way You Make Me Feel” and concentrating on the beginning when he yells “HEY!”; “You were scared.” “Nah, I’m enjoyin this”
• Keyboard songs that we thought were so awesome and actually pretty good until we realized it was mostly because it was late at night
• “Johnny Snotty” being somewhat of our apartment’s theme song
• Tara’s birthday party that Emily and Kyla left early because Emily was pooping her pants, literally…just kidding…sort of
• Going to Salt Lake City to see Kyla’s family and finally meeting Mikey
• Noss hitting Sister Parkinson with the newspaper during the states game
• Our Quote Book
• Halloween cassette tape, primarily the select sounds of the man’s dying breaths and the scream that was in spurts
• Going out to eat sometimes just to get free napkins, lots of them
• The Monday Holidays: ugly shirt day, lobster day, middle name day, monotone day
• The psycho guys at the library that freaked Kyla and Emily out because they ‘hacked’ onto the computer and they didn’t know they were right next to them
• Weezie’s new hairstyle for Relief Society
• Making new bangs for ourselves like Noss’ 80s bangs and Courtnie’s asian bangs etc.
• Singing hymns loudly like men and then the neighbors below calling us
• The girls in 214 calling and pounding on the ceiling to get us to be quiet, especially Courtnie, the loud one
• Kara putting on chapstick

• Max’s proposal with the mix of Peruvian-Irish accents

Everytime I read this list I just crack up laughing so hard. I understand that obviously it won't mean that much to you but if there is a story you are just dieing to hear, let me know.

College Life

· Late night activities in bed: dead voices (“the treasure is buried by the ….b….b….”; “your girlfriend is your sister”, “I killed your parents”) and singing lovely tunes like “michELLE”

· Laughing week: Spongebob laugh, wheezy…etc

· Off-key singing and off-beat dancing

· New language…boles, atocks, be hurry, so me

· Birthday parties: Angela’s” Wayne as UPS stripper, Michelle’s: Barbie and then drinking party, Shannon’s: Gay poetry reading, Emily’s: Michael Jackson

· Watching Empire Records several times to get lines right: “who knows where thoughts come from…they just appear…uh huh” and prove it was funny to Kyla

· Writing computer stories because we were at the library so long and laughing so hard that everyone could hear us

· Emily’s first toot in the library

· Ninja turtle welcome home party for Emily to music by Real McCoy

· Finding out Kyla and Emily were “cousins”

· Kyla wanting to kill me because I kept beating her at California Speed, card game

· Calling Hoges in one night many times to open and close our door because that was her job

· Giving every roommate a “job” Emily’s: lights Kyla’s: food/drink Angela’s: phone Hoges’: doors Shannon’s: remote Michelle’s: car

· Paperball fights at night between Kyla and Emily

· Trey’s closet entrance and exit while home teachers: Kyan and Dallin, were over and they didn’t notice and thought Emily and Kyla were jerks

· Emily grabbing Kyla’s breast in defense at the library

· Playing “hot and cold” at the library with Emily’s coat

· Hitchhiking to Broulim’s and almost getting raped

· Miscellaneous phone calls: voice analysis/singing analysis; breakup with Jorge or he was breaking up with me-pretending on the phone

· Surveying boys over the phone and finding psycho Bob Smith who came over and scared the feces out of us by saying “You don’t know who you’re dealing with” and “I think I find this a lot funnier than you do” and then seeing him on campus several times

· Hitting each other with our backpacks on our way to Geology

· “Dr. Moore” – laughing uncontrollably during his lessons and him saying “I didn’t know rivers were so funny” and then when he caught us off guard and both of our faces went bright red

· Vern as our auto teacher in his little auto mechanic jumpsuit (Earnest P. Worrell’s Vern)

· Playing our extra credit movie in Geology and feeling like dorks because we looked stupid

· Our Hawaii report in Geology and it not working so we were flipping out and ran as fast as we could home to get Kyla’s laptop

· Our idea of honest attraction: “hey, I’m attracted to you, are you attracted to me?” “nope, k, see ya”

· Emily’s sweet present of a traffic violation for Kyla’s birthday

· Kyla talking to Emily while she was in the shower and not knowing Michelle and Hoges were outside listening and then Kyla getting caught as she was coming out

· Accidental exposure to Michelle Andrus of Emily’s privets because Kyla was trying to de-pants her

· “Hello Rexburg!” off the balcony

· Showing Harry and the Hendersons to Kyla’s mom and sister us cracking up and them not at all…except Mikey

· Playing dead all the time, especially at night by falling off of our beds, and then having Emily’s visiting teachers ask her what we do each night in our room…because they could hear us falling on the floor

· Michelle Andrus coming in several nights and telling us to be quiet or “Is there a problem??” in the A.M. and Kyla hiding under the sheets while Emily took the blame

· Burnt dog night when Hoges went crazy over questions of black males

· Kyla and Emily’s water fight, in front of Angela’s boyfriend, that started out small and ended with us drenched from shower heads to sink sprayers to buckets of water (and by buckets we mean buckets)

· Emily laughing hysterically at Singin’ in the Rain the song “Make ‘em Laugh” and crying because she was laughing so hard

· Talks of how to kiss and Emily telling Kyla the art of french kissing

· At the Rexburg Opinion Phone Center (aka ROC), where we worked, talking about Dr. Moore’s mistake of wearing socks with sandals and the noticing Emilys’ crush behing us wearing socks with sandals---the next day= no socks…just sandals…ouch

· Kyla sticking the pencil down Emily’s butt during a phone call to serve as a distraction during phone surveys

· Emily pointing but ending up poking Kyla in the lip right when Kyla’s phone picked up someoned and so she couldn’t stop laughing throughout the whole introduction

· Emily’s new hick pronunciation with vowels drawn out long i.e. “Naaaational”

· Poof hair guy in auto so we didn’t know if he was a poof or what

· The “sheman” at the play “Homecooking” and us trying so diligently to figure out the sex of that human-being…it was a woman…we think

· Emily’s going psycho one night over the perfect laugh for her monologue…it having a bit psycho laugh so Emily did all laughs possible with insight from roomies

· Emily’s night of halitosis at the play “Homecooking”

· Hiding behind the tree at the Hart building calling to people as if we were birds “Hey you two…you two….lookuphere lookuphere…kaa kaa”

Writing down our ‘best of’ names from calls at the Opinion Center:

David Junker

Edward Kargas

Marjorie Dykes

David Scruggs

Pamela Scheeflock

Janaki Kakarala

James Hickenlooper

Kaye Vandenboom

Sallie Poindexter

Wesley Engebretson

Sample introduction: “Hi I’m ____ from RoperASW, a national public opinion research firm. We’re conducting an important study of publications people read. We’re not selling anything…"

Best answering machine: Old lady: “How do you like me now…now that I’m on my way…you can leave a message…what have you got to say…. [beeeeep]”