Sadey

This weekend Sadey, one of my very best friends, made the trek from provo to visit!!
She came with her boyfriend, Spencer and his roommate Nate. Who are both really cool :) And who both happen to be Jeff Chapman's roommates..small world!!

It's always fun to see Sadey, because she makes everything so exciting. The fact that i'm married, and now have an apartment was really tripping her out!
Sadey can always make me laugh- and she is so fun to be around! Sadey and i have been friends for as long as we can remember. We have so many funny and crazy memories. And so many weird, and dumb things we've done. She reminded me this weekend of the time i only had my drivers permit, we were home alone at my house, so we came up with the idea to take my mom's camry to get ice cream- and we did!! WOW! What the heck were we thinking? Were we thinking?

I'm pretty sure i already told that story to you..right mom and dad?!

Thanks for comin Sade!
p.s. it just solidified the fact that she is one of my best friends when the movie she picked out to watch was "Chocolat"!! My all time favorite movie...and all the boys rolled their eyes, i believe brett even walked away, and started getting ready for bed. I guess i've made him watch that one to many times. If you havn't seen it yet- you need to!

Oh and i got a haircut!! It's pretty short for me... i'm still getting used to it, and i'm not sure i'm crazy about it. But it's hair- it grows!

10,000 the Dice Game

The other weekend when they were up here, Kate & Clark taught us this super fun dice game called 10,000
It's a nail-biting, risk-taking, rambunctious game that is sooo fun!
We had a game night at Lorry & Dave's Sunday night with our other friend's Kelly and David. I had to post some pictures and videos of how exciting the game gets...

Lorry & Dave are so much fun..we love hanging out with them, we are sad they are leaving in December! But...I suppose it's better that they are getting their college education and moving on!! However...I think they should hang around at least one more semester, to be our neighbors and friends. I mean, Brett & I have been such great neighbors to them, don't you think they owe it to us to hang around for us?! We will miss them! :)

Kelly & Derek are great friends too. They were on our softball team, and are such a cute couple. Kelly is fun to play this game with; she tries to get everyone else to take risks and lose it all, but when it's her turn she stops at the bare minimum- no risks! It's fun to tease her about it.

Brett seemed to get into it the most. On every singe one of his turns he pushed his chair back and stood up, blew into the dice for good luck and rolled with all the enthusiasm he has. (which is a lot, as most of you know) He gets a little iffy though, if the dice hit a crack in the table he deemed he needed a re-do....pu-lease...

Here are some funny vidoes of our night

H1N1

H1N1

Brett & I had a ward party tonight, so we needed a costume. We decided that we would be the swine flu since, I mean, c'mon we both had it and conquered it!! :) So, we cut out some pig ears, a tail and a snout...

Isn't he such a cute little piggy?!

• We won 3rd place for our costumes at the Halloween party! We won a bag of snickers, score!
  

• Second place were dressed us as Jesse and Woody from Toy Story, they looked great

• First place was so original. The wife was a huge quarter, the husband was wearing a cardboard self-made gumball machine and their little 8 month old baby girl was a gumball- cute!!

Happy Halloween

Sweet & Sour

This post is titled Sweet & Sour because there has been some sweet things going on lately and some sour. This first picture is Sweet. Our weekend treat was home made caramel pecan popcorn. So good!!

This was a cool recipe. I popped popcorn kernels over the stove in this pot with a little bit of oil in the bottom. Then after the popcorn was popped, we melted sugar in the pot until it was caramel. Then added butter, vanilla and vinegar. Then added the pecans and popcorn and stirred it all together!

This was also a sweet. Kate and Clark came and visited us. Kate went to school here so it was fun for her to see it changing. Pretty sure Clark just thought that BYU-I was just a building in the middle of snow plains- so it was good that we clarified that for him. :)

We went bowling, to the temple and to lunch with them. Bowling was a lot of fun. Kate and I were both having an "off" day (since usually we both pretty much bowl a perfect game) right kate? :) so we were a little frustrated....but it was still fun.

Sadly- oh uh, i mean luckily... :) Brett and Clark both share the passion of Golf. So we made time to go to the driving range and they taught Kate and I how to improve our golf game. Don't get me wrong- I support Brett's love of golf, it's just i can't golf 24/7 like my hubby can!

This is where the story gets sour. Grandpa passed away Thursday, October 15th. He was such an example of generosity, kindness and humility.

I went home for the funeral this weekend, it was really nice to be there with family and to say a final good-bye to Grandpa.
Grandpa's backyard was always such a jungle-gym to me growing up. He loved having his big garden and many fruit trees. This is his famous pomegranate tree; i took a few home this weekend...

This picture is really cute of mom & dad

family

Alex Showing off his moves!

The Latest

We have been really busy up here in Rexburg lately. We've had lots of visitors and we LOVE it!
The first weekend Dustin and Jeff came. Than Denae and her kids
came and then we went down to Utah for general conference! FUN!

I'm not sure why, but lately for all these fun events I haven't had my camera!! So, most of these are courtesy of Kaley :)
This is at Angie's house, they were so nice and let us stay there while we were in Utah. We had so much fun with all the nieces and nephews. Little Mylie warmed up to me on this trip...isn't she so cute?!

The gang hangin out for general conference

Denae and the kids came last week. Denae hadn't been up here since it was Rick's college so it was so fun to show her around. This is us at Craigo's.

After dinner we went bowling on campus.

Denae's kids were such great sports during their stay at our place! Brett and I felt bad that the kids were confined to our little apartment...but they seemed to have a fun time!!

One of highlights of their stay was going to bear world. It's just down the street from Rexburg, and they have bears roaming around while you drive through the park...!

These are the cutest little bear cubs

A bear right outside our car window! Remeber how bad Brett wanted to see a bear in Lake Tahoe?! Well, he was just a car door away on this trip!! (However, something tells me he will still be seeking a higher adrenaline bear meeting in Tahoe next year)

At bear world they had a petting zoo...

This crazy goat chased brett all around the petting zoo... It was scary and hilarious. I'm going to post the video soon!

Having Dustin and Jeff come up was fun. Brett loves to party with them, and they all get so hyper when they're together... One of the fun things we did was going to a corn maze. (A little to my dismay...I really dislike being scared, and i don't define it as fun) but i sucked it up and went, and actually had a fun time.

They boys and girls split up, so kaley and i had fun playing tag with the boys. Like i've said in earlier posts, Kaley is brave so i felt safe walking around with her. :)
This is what the scary corn rows looked like!!!!!! Looks like a scene from a horror film!

Last and not least, we started a softball team. This is our team, minus one couple.

From left; Dave & Lorry our neighbors, brett and i, kaley, the tall guy in the back is Stephen brett and Kaley's cousin, Katy is in the blue shirt in the front, bryce brett's friend is in the blue hat in the back and Danny, brett and Kaley's other cousin is on the far right: Fun team!

I hadn't touched a bat in three years and I was pretty sure I would strike out and be horrible, and i WAS NOT fantastic, but it was super fun!
Go Team Smalls!

The Tree of Life

"The Tree of Life"

My Grandma Crowley was a big traveler in her earlier years. She had been all over the world, including Egypt, Russia,China and parts of south America. Her house was full of amazing things that she had collected over her many travels. I loved going to her house and asking her where she got all her wonderful souvenirs.

She's passed on now, and when she died she left two pieces of art like this one to my cousin Brent. Brent knowing how much i loved this particular one and being the amazingly nice and awesome cousin that he is; he gave it to me.

This is a piece of art my grandma got in Egypt. It is on papyrus and is so beautiful. The Egyptians really had many beliefs and parts of their religion that are similar to ours today.

It is called "The Tree of Life" because each bird represents a stage of life. It starts with the light green bird in the lower right hand corner than continues counter-clockwise.

• the light green bird symbolizes infancy
• the red bird symbolizes childhood
• the gray bird represents youth
• the black/yellow bird represents adulthood
• and the last bird represents old age

In ancient Egypt, the direction east was considered the direction of life because the sun rose in the east. West was thought to be the direction of death, of entering the under world because the sun set in the west. They believed that during the night, the sun traveled through the under world to make it's way back to the east so it could rise again on the next day.

Notice that on the tree of life, the four birds of life are all facing east, but the last bird that represents old age is facing west, in anticipation of death

Good thing i have my strong husbad to help me hang pictures!! :)

These are a few of my favorite things...

Favortie Thing #1 :
Lately, I have really been enjoying the food network channel. Growing up, I always thought watching someone cook on T.V. was the most pointless thing on the planet. Why watch someone cook, when you can just get the recipe and dive in and figure it out yourself?

However, my opinion has been changed. I LOVE watching the food network channel. I especially enjoy Barefoot Contessa, I think she's great. She's so earthy and her kitchen decor is by far my favorite out of all the shows the food network hosts. Not that the way her kitchen looks has anything to do with the way she or I cook... but it makes me feel clean. Which makes me like her food. Strange, I know.
Sometimes it can put me to sleep; the way the camera-men zoom in on parsley being chopped or a stew boiling... but recently I have been learning a lot and staying awake!

The other day Ina made these; pecan squares!
Here's the recipe
You'll probably want to cut the recipe in half. I did; and it still made A TON!

I realize hers look way better. That's just because of the fancy cameras they have. Trust me. :)
Brett and I really are enjoying them...
Brett has been going to the refrigerator a lot these past couple of days...
Favorite Thing #2:
Brett and I still had some gift cards, so as an investment and as a treat we got season five of the office. One of the best decisions we've ever made. Enough said.

Favorite Thing #3:

I can eat oatmeal every meal of every day. I know Julie can probably agree with me... It's SO good...in everything! I'm beginning to drool. These are the ways I eat it:

• pour some oats in a bowl and pour some milk over; eat and enjoy!
• open a yogurt and put a few spoonfuls of oats in...so good
• Top oatmeal with frozen fruit and milk and microwave
  
• Add some on top of any cereal I am eating
• also good in cookie dough...
  

Favorite Thing #4:
This is a little embarrassing, but my family already knows- I have an infatuation for feet pajamas. I've always thought they were they greatest invention. I like them so much in fact, that my good friend Brittany Mayer got them for me one Christmas.
Look Britt, i still where them! :)

I love how snuggly and warm you feel. Plus, they're so fun to run around in because they make you feel like your a kid again.

Favorite Thing #5: Whiskers on Kittens...
TEASIN!
If you havn't seen "The Sound of Music" in a while, then that probably wasn't very funny to you.