Rachel's Run

Early this morning, (it was FREEZING today!) Camille and I were able to participate in Rachel's Run--a 5K or 1-mile walk with proceeds going towards fighting cancer. Rachel is a girl from Camille's ward and we wanted to do something to help out. We ended up doing the 1-mile walk (primarily because I'm not sure I can actually run a 5K, but also because Camille is pregnant--isn't she CUTE?!), and we were proud that only 5 runners beat us! :D
Steve and I have made workout schedules for ourselves so that we will be able to participate in the Onion Days 5K on Labor Day. I'm pretty excited! Steve's goal is to run it under 24 minutes, and mine is just to run it. I'll worry about times once I have actually worked myself up to running 3 miles. Wish us luck!

New experiences

I learned the name of a bird today. This pretty little thing was sitting in the tree right outside my apartment while I was working on my primary lesson for tomorrow. I thought it was probably one of the more beautiful birds that i had ever seen, but by the time I had the camera out, it had flown away. Isn't she pretty? Its called a Western Tanager, just FYI.

Parlez vous Fracais

With Steve's help, I have begun my French instruction. When my older brother Kevin got his mission call to Uruguay, I thought it was cool that he would get to learn another language. So, while he was gone for two years speaking Spanish, I thought I would try to learn a different language by the time he got home. I chose ASL and it was exciting for me.

Now that my little brother, Scott, is off on his mission in Brazil speaking Portuguese, I decided that I wanted to learn French. So, if Eric goes foreign-speaking, I guess I'll have to learn a 3rd foreign language!

DISNEYLAND!!!

As a graduation trip for both Steve and me (Steve will graduate in December), we took a trip to Disneyland in Anaheim, California. Thank you Shauna and Pat for taking care of Joshua while we were gone!

These pictures are in no particular order, just so you know
We used our maps so much, that they really started to fall apart.
This is California Adventure, which we actually went to each of the three days. We enjoyed the tall white roller coaster (California Screamin') and we entertained many people on the ride by making different faces for the camera each time we went through. We ended up buying our favorite, where we agreed the look as scared as possible. We still haven't stopped laughing about it. The ferris wheel was pretty cool. The middle contained gondolas that swung back and forth on their own track.
We posed with several characters including Sully from Monsters Inc., Jesse from ToyStory, Mickey Mouse, and Princesses Mulan, Belle and Tiana. Our wait to see the Princesses was by far our longest wait of the whole trip, and we seriously had people giving us strange looks because we didn't have a little girl with us.

This was my very first carousel ride. I promise I wasn't really scared...

We enjoyed a couple of water rides, but Steve forgot that the person in the front of Splash Mountain got the wettest. Although we didn't get a picture, can you guess who was in the front?

Classic Disney hats.

We loved the parades! They had some really fun dancing and all of the kids got so excited to see the Disney and Pixar characters that came through! They also had some pretty neat floats!
On our second day, after we had exhausted our feet the first day, we decided to try and see some shows. We got to see about 5 or 6 and all of them were spectacular! We had a great time!

One of the buildings had a class that, every half hour, you could learn to draw a different rough sketch of simpler Disney characters. The three we learned were Goofy, Winnie the Pooh, and Jack from The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Strong man in ToonTown

We enjoyed Muppets 3D, but I didn't particularly like the Bug's Life 3D. I was seriously freaking out. I took this picture for Karen.

Out in front

Legoland was fun. This is Darth Vader and behind Steve, you can see the legs to the giant giraffe

Yet another classic shot. I loved the princess themes and especially all of the Disney music that played throughout the park.

Dapper Dans--they entertained us almost as much as the Asian girls to the right who shrieked with laughter any time the song was specifically directed to them.

Favorite show: Aladdin--the genie was fabulous and the effects were awesome

Favorite ride: Natalie--Space Mountain

Steve--Toy Story Mania

We really did have a blast and it was so nice to come home and be with our baby boy again.

BYU Grad!

It has finally happened! I am officially a BYU graduate!

On Wednesday April 21, I took my last final and finished my formal schooling. I'm pleased to say that it only took me 8 minutes, and I'm fairly certain that I got an A on it! :D

Thursday was the huge Commencement walk. I got to walk with my brother Kevin and his wife, Kristen. We also found my cousin, Maggie Richards, and Kevin's friend and former roommate, Jeremy Alsup. It was fun to be able to walk with so many friends! There ended up being over 6100 graduates and we got to sit in the front row right behind the podium.

My parents were also excited to have gotten to celebrate Steve's graduation while they were here. We found out about a luncheon for the 2010 Food Science Graduates and since he will be graduating in December, he was invited to bring his family. It was fun to celebrate with him as well!

Because Elder Christofferson, the commencement speaker, is related to us through my Aunt Brynn, we were able to get three tickets for Steve, dad and mom to sit in the nice seats down on the floor. They also got to meet Elder Christofferson and also the BYU President, President Samuelson. It was pretty neat!

Friday was the smaller convocation. I opted to walk with Kevin and Kristen again so that mom and dad didn't have to sit through two ceremonies. We ended up being the only threesome that walked in his convocation. I'm so happy to be done!