It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like...Christmas?

Halloween is over, so that brings us to the final stretch of school and into the exciting holiday season! Already at Walmart they have Christmas decorations and such (probably because Thanksgiving is less commercialised and it's mostly about food, which you're going to buy anyway), and there are at least two radio stations that, other than on Sundays, have Christmas music playing (FM100.3 and Today's 106.5). For our own part, we never took down the Christmas lights in the living room from last year...

As far as life goes, it's been relatively uneventful. A few highlights include...

...completing Lucretia Hupper Mower's journal transcription. Here is one of her poems:

Creation

'Twas God who made this beautiful earth
And caus'd the flowers to grow
That brought the lofty mountains forth
And bade the streamlets flow
He made the sun to shine by day
The moon to rule the night
While stars pursue their shining way
And lend their lesser light.

He form'd the beast to roam the plain
The birds to skim the air
The fish to cleave the raging main
And make their dwelling there
He holds in his Almighty hand
All things that live and move
And rules upon the sea and land
By his eternal love.

...discovering in said journal a song entitled Little Barefoot (lyrics), which is similar to one of Thomas' partially completed songs:

Hidden Signs

"Will work for food" the man's sign said,
Along the side of the road.
Yet there were few who stopped and read
For the weather out there was too cold.
Had he a name and whence did he come?
The thought always crosses their mind.
But thought without action, nor action alone
Will never those answers find.

Chorus
The signs are many, and by many deplored,
The trait of caring is ignored.
Is humanity, the love of man,
Simply a trifle we cannot afford?
So, my friends, it's up to you
no matter who or when
To read the signs and follow them
To help your fellow man.

"Stranded from home.
Any help, please"
A helpless woman's silent cry.
But no one truly sees
The plights in her life, the tears in her eyes
Attract only looks of scorn
Her family is somewhere but she's looked all her life
And the soles of her shoes are worn.

...watching Fires of Faith, a three-part BYUtv feature about the coming forth of the English Bible.

...attending Crazy for You, a Gershwin showpiece put on by the Copper Hills High Theatre and directed by Thomas' cousin:

Theatrical cowboys

The gang

We were impressed by the acting and the sets

Bela Zangler "beside himself"

Us with the famous Morrells

...and, of course, going to the temple (sorry, no photos...the camera battery was dead. No complaints...it's taken 1000+ photos since it last charged!)

Anyway, see you next time! Have to go eat chocolate pudding...

Ch-ch-changes

Ok, so there haven't been very many changes, but you will have to wait till the end of this post for the ones I refer to in the title.

We got pretty good use out of the Halloween costumes I sewed for us this year. Although they are (still) not entirely finished, we got them done enough to wear to 3 Halloween parties:

(Thomas' costume is definitely more noteworthy than mine, despite the contradictory head wrap.)

(1) a get-together with some of my former roommates:

Tyson and Dara. (frog & mime) They made some excellent homemade root beer!

The engaged-to-be-married Cody and Beth (seen here as Gaston and Belle)

President Obama even graced us with his presence! (Sarah & John)

"Mr. Obama" was trying to heat up some food but came across the "Child" setting. We were concerned at first that this was a cooking setting (similar to "popcorn" or "potato") but we think it in fact meant that the microwave had been child-locked.

(2) our ward's Halloween party/trunk-or-treat. No photos, apparently, but we spent the evening working the donut-on-a-string booth with some other young marrieds.

(3) Thomas' work Halloween party:

We also wore them Halloween night, to show off to our 2 trick-or-treaters (although they came when I was finishing up the laundry at the laundromat... so only Thomas saw them). We were surprised at the huge decline in numbers from last year (when we had like... 8).

Overall we're happy with how our costumes turned out, and we're excited to keep them forever to use for nativities/Halloween/etc.

Among our other activities, we helped celebrate our friend David's birthday:

Thanks again for having a birthday, David! We enjoyed the cake & ice cream & seeing you guys.

We babysat my visiting teaching companion's cutie pie kids last weekend for a few hours. They are so precious. I wish I could show a picture but apparently we didn't take any... oh well.

Last Tuesday, I enjoyed the great privilege of attending a BYU devotional where President Thomas S. Monson addressed the university.

you can kind of tell that he's walking onto the stage here... he's the first one at the top of the ramp.

Our real "big news," though, is that since the New Testament filming finished last month, and Thomas wore his costume with his beard for Halloween, he decided it was time to ditch the extra hair and facial hair...

Before...

During...

...during... (I told him he could pull off a goatee...)

...during...

...during...(he had a straight razor shave, too!)

...After! I hardly recognize the fellow...

I decided I needed a change too (though mine's not as drastic):

added some color (darker brown/reddish) and got new (better) layers.

...oh, and I changed my major. I officially have 3 more semesters until I finish.

oxox