REALLY?

A Snow Day For This?!?
I'm loving it...

It's Christmas!!

I am so excited we put up our Christmas tree finally! We left our lights and star for the top at home but it still turned out way cute! I decided we would start a tradition of having donuts and hot chocolate when we decorated our trees. West Virigina doesn't sell yummy donuts so we tried a new recipe that was supposed to taste like Krispy Kremes. Jake was skeptical and kept saying he would rather have popcorn but I was determined to eat a donut... it has been so long! So the recipe said to heat the oil to 350 degrees but niether of us knew how hot that would be on the stove so we just turned it on high. After a few minutes I dropped the first donut in and it instantly turned black. It started smoking and suddenly there was a fire!! The smoke detectors were going crazy and all we could see was smoke! It was pretty intense but luckily the fire went out when I turned the stove down and then we had to open all the windows (even though we were already freezing cold!) and fan the smoke out. The funniest part was Jake had mentioned to our nieghbor that I was making donuts so we would bring him over some and I guess he was getting ansy because right when the smoke detectors stopped he rang our bell and starting asking how the donuts went but just starting laughing when he saw all the smoke. Luckily once the oil cooled down I totally redeemed myself and made the most delicous donuts we have eaten in a LONG time! Our nieghbor was a bit hesitant to try them but after the first bite he stuffed the rest of the donut in his mouth and said he was very surprised at how good they were!

Thankful for Family!

Checking out Cincinnati's campus. It is so cool because it is all right there way compacted! It was raining so we were freezing and took a running tour but what we saw of it was cool!

So we accidentally left our turkey out all day and night so Thanksgiving morning we were pretty nervous about using it but we called the turkey expert aka my dad and he said we should be fine? So we took a gamble and cooked it and it was delicous and luckily no one got sick!!

The FEAST!!

I am so grateful for family especially around the holidays. We didn't get to go home for Thanksgiving but we did get to go to Cincinnati to stay with my cousins and it was so much fun!! We have such funny cousins and we loved being able to hang out with them and their dang cute kids for the whole week! We got there late Tuesday night and when we pulled up to their house Jake started pounding the candy because he felt like his sugar was low and he kept saying he did not want my cousins to see him with his sugar low. We go inside and start to chat and I realize Jake's sugar is low so my cousin starts making some juice and I give Jake his tester. Jake of course denies it and will not drink anything he just keeps insisting that he is fine. Luckily he drank a capri sun but it did not seem to work and Jake kept getting more crazy. He was wrapping his arms around my cousin and winking at him telling him his sugar was not low- in a slow way with a weird accent. He then tried to chase the two year old. He was making everyone nervous because he was acting so wierd and I could not control him. He was jumping and snapping randomly then he would run over to my cousin and wink at him. Their girls were getting nervous and we could not get him to drink anything. Suddenly Jake hands me his wedding ring, shoes and socks and takes off running out the front door into the pitch black. I tried to hold on to him but he was too fast and he was around the corner before I knew what was happening! My cousin was ready to call an ambulance because we could not control Jake but luckily when we went running outside there was Jake walking back WAY embarrassed yelling that this was more embarrassing then being a BYU fan and then he admitted his darkest secret... he is now a Utah fan! Haha obviously he was still out of it but he did drink another juice and then he was fine! It was so funny!! We had a delicous Thanksgiving dinner and loved just relaxing and playing games with family! We are so grateful they invited us to share Thanksgiving with them!

Two Tickets to Pittsburgh

We had so much fun this weekend partying it up! Friday night we went to the WVU basketball game. It was only an exhibition game so they totally killed the team it was fun!

Then Saturday we woke up and drove to Pittsburgh. We went site seeing and then of course hit the mall. It was so much fun to be able to go shopping again it feels like its been FOREVER!! After the mall we went to look around the university and we saw some really pretty cathedrals.

But the very best part of the entire weekend was always coming home to this fun piano that I got for my birthday!! I absolutely love it and I always want to play it. One of our favorite features on the piano is the different sounds we can set it to. Our very favorite is the laughing because each note has a different laugh and it is so entertaining!!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

BEFORE....
AFTER!!!

And the best part is Jake's costume was $2.11!!

I LOVE HALLOWEEN!

The BEST part about living away from home....

My dad came to visit us for the weekend! It was so much fun to be able to have my dad all to ourselves and just hang out! This is definitely a benefit to living out of state because usually my dad is very busy with work or chuch stuff that we never get to just hang out for the entire weekend back in Utah. But since we were in West Virginia there were no meetings or appointments my dad had to go to so we could really party it up! I loved not having to share him with anybody! On Friday we rode the PRT (a wierd car with no driver) downtown for dinner and an art walk. I was so excited for the art walk but it turned out it was a bit of a bust. Most people were just there to get free wine and so it was over crowded and not very good art pieces. So we went home and played the Wii and watched BYU get killed... GO AGGIES! It turns out my dad is quite the gamer- which we never knew- and killed us in Wii basketball! Saturday we woke up early and went to the student rec center and played racketball- which again he killed me in! Then we went on a hike to a lookout where Jake became adventurous and tried to climb in between rocks only to get stuck becuase he couldn't move his hump in his back. I could tell his sugar was going low and he could not move. I was pretty panicked especially when the rock he moved to broke off and tumbled down the cliff but luckily he made it out eventually. It was so much fun to have my dad in West Virginia and show him our stomping grounds!

Weekend Getaway

One good thing about living back east is that we are so close to so many cool attractions. Every third week after Jake's test we love to plan a weekend getaway to relieve some of the stress.

This weekend we went to DC to stay with my old roommate Megan. Friday afternoon right after Jake finished his test we headed for DC. We picked up Megan and Matt and headed to Georgetown to eat dinner. It was a really cute area with tons of shops and good places to eat. Unfortunately it was late so all of the shops were closed and we were too hungry to wait for a table at the restaurants so we ended up eating at Johnny Rockets, but it was really good!

Then we went to the Pentagon Memorial. I didn't even know there was a memorial there but it was a really neat garden. It had these water fountains categorized by the age of the person that died on 9/11. They went from youngest to oldest and had the names of the people on the concrete design. They were facing opposite directions depending on if the person was on the plane or in the Pentagon. I was amazed at how creative and detailed the garden was set up.

Saturday morning we woke up early and headed for the DC temple. I LOVE the DC temple!

It is so huge!! It is totally hidden in the hills and trees until you are literally there. After the temple we went to the holocaust museum. It was something we really wanted to do on our honeymoon but they always ran out of tickets before we got there. It was really interesting but a little bit too depressing. It literally made us sick. Near the end I just wanted to leave but luckily they had ended on a postive by showing all of the people that helped the Jews and how many people they saved. After that we went to lunch and then headed to the Eastern Market. I loved being able to hang out with my old roommate Megan again! We had so much fun and I am glad we live kinda close so we can hang out again soon!