Small update

I'm working on a 2014 Review but it's long and slightly depressing so I may not post it.

Penny turned 3 months on Christmas day.
-she makes an italian fist with her hand and shakes it at me like this
-Her favorite word to say is "glue" I pretend that she is saying "I love you" because it sounds kind of similar
-She had her first sickness. It was sad to witness. She officially has an ear infection and we are working on recovering. She was doing great with her bedtime routine before she got it so let's hope she keeps that up.
-I filmed 5 seconds every hour of her Christmas day and I'll put that video together....sometime.
-Penny was our New Years Kiss!

I believe in family.

Toes

Bearded feet from Fesler Films on Vimeo.

Trying to keep up by documenting some of my favorite small habits penny does. This is one of them.

Happy 3 Year Anniversary!

Easter 2014

Strangers

I like candid pictures...and taking of pictures of people I don't necessarily know. Near booming NYC attractions, it's easy to take pictures of people without them noticing (some I asked.)

Mrs. Doubtfire

What a selfie

Here are a few of my favorite things..

Last Episode, Rockefeller Tree and Face Painting

"....Monday you went to work, came home, and we fell asleep super early. It was wonderful. Tuesday you were gone until after 9 or 10. Which was also wonderful. Wednesday we worked out pretty much all day. What? Say it say it, what. Thursday was our magnificent day in the city and we did gloriously beautiful things, no questions asked. Friday night you worked, came home and both of us for some reason were exhausted so we went to sleep. Saturday was a great day, we worked out for hours, did laundry and yea and then we went to our dance thing, it was great. I think there is a reason I don't do the blog posts, catch my drift? Catch my, feel my, catch a drift? It's a rhyme time to be in a prime time. Where should I put these cookies? Lizi babe?  What? What are you laughing at, huh? What chu laughing at girl? Hey, Hey I said. Don't start writing stuff down what I say."-Dave

There's a time in your life that you realize you have just met an interesting person, not saying that everyone doesn't have their own odd quirks but you come across people who are extra special once and a while. I was requested to shoot on Tuesday for the last episode because we were going to have to do the kill scene twice and they wanted their "blood specialist" to be there.  Cleaning up the fake blood was extremely difficult because we used 4 times as much blood than usual, plus some cranberry sauce for coagulation. I actually spent my entire lunch hour cleaning up after it. This made me lose my appetite, spaghetti definitely didn't look appetizing after that.

I have found a mockingjay on set, if I hum a certain song by our second camera man I can hear the song eventually jump from each person until everyone in the crew has hummed it. My personal favorite song to make contagious on set is "Elmo's world." The story behind that is that a few episodes ago, they asked me to name a rap song and then they started singing some strange arrangement of who knows what so I said, "Elmo's world?"

The lady at the location we were shooting talked to her dolls as if they were real children. Plus, she had a tons of dolls in every room, the creepy kind that stare at you wherever you are in the room. To top that, there was a hibernating bear in the backyard. We could see it from the back porch window.

At the end of the day, I was washing the dishes we used in our episode and that's when it hit me. Life suddenly ran in slow motion. I could see other crew members running behind me in the reflection of the back window and just sunk it in-trying to enjoy the dwindling moments. I don't know why but I seem to always be the only person that is not ready for these types of things to end.

Wednesday I set up a LA Fitness guest pass account so that I could run these last two freezing cold weeks. I guess Dave thinks we worked out all day. I made Champ pose for pictures and he wasn't thrilled about it.

THURSDAY WAS A BIG DAY FOR US. I woke up cranky, when things come to an end I can sometimes get a little on the snarky side but the best medicine was going to take pictures in the city. Dave gave me a limit. I was only allowed to take 2 pictures....I only took 400. I got up the guts to take pictures of strangers at the Rockefeller tree because the people were usually too distracted by the view to notice me, my personal favorite is a picture I took of a girl taking a selfie (believe me, it's a funny one.)

Christmastime in the city has officially became my very favorite time of year. They encourage CHRISTMAS on every street corner and wrap entire buildings up like presents. Walking around is a magical experience, I'm so glad I have survived long enough to walk around NYC during Christmas season.

I had a friend who recommended that I try a butter beer from starbucks, I asked if it had caffeine and my friend reassured me that it was decaf. Well, they were wrong. After walking around 3 miles in the city, I was tired until I had that drink. Suddenly, my speech became fast and I wanted to go to the gym. We went and I did a zumba class, didn't feel like I was expending enough energy and then ran 5.5 miles....do you think it had caffeine?

My family celebrates a European Christmas holiday called The Nikolaus, our version is a lot less scary than the original holiday. So Dave and I tried to inconspicuously find out what everyone's favorite candy bar is. That turned into Maja yelling to everyone in each corner of the house, asking their favorite candy bar. We put everyone's boots on the front porch, filled their shoes with candy and then waited until morning....then it rained all night. So much for that idea lol.

Friday was the last day my crew was in the office...I'll be a little lost without them in the office. Atlas decided to have a lot of meetings on Friday too so it was a very busy day. I walked around in the rain all morning. Went to two very long meetings and one significant question later, I still had to finish all of the expense reports. By 8:30pm Alex told me to just go home, she even took everything left to do out of my hand. I will finish those up next week but I wanted to make sure she got everything done she needed to.

Saturday we went to the gym and got ready for Maddie's dance fundraiser. They recruited me to be a face painter....little does Katie know how much I LOVE to face paint. I can space out everything else in the world and focus on creating a beautiful masterpiece on a childs face. I only got like 10 faces painted by the end but they were glorious. The same thing happened this time that happened last spring at my niece's carnival. The other face painters get really weird around me...do you remember that Linda? It's odd because I'm not trying to compete or anything, I really just focus on butterflies, unicorn's and fairies. There usually is one really loud girl that begins yelling, "I'm an artist, I want to paint your face." I'm fine with that, paint their face. If they are in my line, let them decide haha.

The dancing is phenomenal there. It's a dance studio that is run by an Alvin Ailey alumni and you feel the emotion from every dance. There also was a tiny little redhead that looked exactly like Sadie Coleman dancing to the nutcracker.

I believe in giant Christmas Trees.

34th Street, Macy's Day Parade and Thanksgiving

On Monday at work, I finished the binder. Well, up until episode 210....and made a to-do list for the rest..and a table of contents. It made Alex so happy she shrieked with joy to see it (basically, that means it was totally worth it.) We also had our last pre-production meeting. I guess they started their first episode while sipping milkshakes at the the diner on 34th and to fulfill the tradition we all went to the diner on 34th to discuss episode 212. I have seen a lot of the small diner, which I don't think is particularly popular but is in a sublime location. It was much more than a production meeting, we all discussed what we're doing afterwards (which is pretty all around nothing since Frenemies ends at such an awkward time) and options of what to do from here. I cannot believe how wonderful it is to work with people who value your strengths. I know I have a lot to learn when it comes to filmmaking but working with a crew that recognizes the importance of hard work and helps me learn where I fall short will be hard to leave and start again. 

Tuesday we arrived in Oneonta (did you see my "Macys Day Parade" picture? I was there....just a lot earlier than the rest of the parade.) It's a good thing we decided to leave a little earlier for Oneonta because apparently the weather was going to be absolutely nasty Wednesday and Thursday. We had quite the snow storm but I didn't find it nasty, rather, I felt the weather was welcoming the holiday season. Kim practiced her aerobic routine with me, I think it was odd for her because we do aerobics a lot together but we never are facing each other. I am well aware that I am an awkward mover. 

During this visit, Lucy figured out how to say "Dave" and everything became "Dave." The car keys were "Dave," my phone (has a picture of him on it) was "Dave," any bearded man in the mall was "Dave," the picture of Jesus in the hallway was "Dave" and we both preferred this over last time we went to Oneonta (she literally cried everytime he came near her.) She was also very concerned that dave wasn't included in whatever was happening. If Mary and I were giving soft tickles to one another, Lucy would command us to soft tickle him. If she had to take a nap and everyone was giving her kisses, she would then say "Dave?" My name was occassionally "Dave" as well because I guess "Lizi" is harder for an 18-month old. 

Wednesday I was informed that my exam had been graded and I promised Dave I wouldn't check my score until after the Thanksgiving break....well, I peeked. I got the exact score I needed to graduate, what a miracle! I became a little sad because I didn't really end college on a strong point but then I remembered how wonderful it was that I'm where I am and that the next day is Thanksgiving I got over it quickly (Thank you btw for those of you who sent me kind words about my last blog post, I didn't intend to be depressing but thank you for being so nice to me.) 

Thanksgiving Day 2013 we spent in a cottage-like home, toasty on the inside and enough snow to play in on the outside. Kim is the best cook in the world. Buddy and Mary fight over who will be "willed" Kim's cookbook, Buddy apparently thinks it would sell on Ebay for 14 million dollars. I also missed my dear Grandma Pace today, I always think of her around Thanksgiving. The holiday smell alone reminds me of the great Thanksgiving's I've spent near my Grandmother. My mother was so kind and roped Erika into setting up skype so we could see the family. Not only were Grandma and Grandpa there but I got to see CLAIRE JARVIS. I totally understand that 2-year old and miss her often. I love it when Katie calls because I will often get to speak to Claire as well (I like speaking to Katie too.) Near the evening, we welcomed in the holiday season with some desserts and games. I'm pretty sure I win every game of zilch that I play....right Dave?

Friday We got to see Catching Fire. I know, everybody loves the movie. I admit it was done very well. I won't lie, it makes me so anxious but the book did too so at least it's consistent! Living in conditions so bleak as the setting of the Hunger Games really scares me. Kim and I exercised everyday while I was in Oneonta too but that's because we both find exercise therapeutic.

Saturday, we loved being in Oneonta but it began to set in that our stay was coming to the end...and that we don't know when we will be able to see the Noorlander's again. I tried really hard not to focus on that fact, I hate goodbye's and I say goodbye's too often. We set up Christmas decorations and Danny is a great decorator. I also can only go so many days without taking pictures or filming something and I couldn't handle that it had been a while so I spent the evening filming Lucy dancing in front of the christmas tree.

I met a woman on Sunday who turned 100 last month. I also was called the "calm" one in my family although we asked Dave if that's true and he disagrees that I'm calm. Kim made the best pretzels on earth and I have been craving them lately so it was perfect to be able to eat eight soft pretzels to help my craving. The family let us skype in on Advent in the evening and it was a perfect ending...for now. 

Today at work I talked to four strangers about their lives. I guess people are more talkative right after Thanksgiving. OR I'm a more social person after I've spent nearly a week with Kim. That makes more sense. We also went into what I picture Bakery Heaven would look like. Dave refuses to eat our advent calendar chocolates though, he is too afraid they will taste like cardboard. I do not have a fear of eating chocolate.

I believe in the Holidays.

The Bronx, my FINAL and Pretending Salem NY is Las Vegas

Monday I was done, I had enough of the sickness. I decided to recover and to take my sleep very seriously. I haven't really been able to breath let alone let myself sleep. I usually expect to hate Novembers and if being sick the entire month is the worst that it gets, I'll take that over some of my past Novembers. If you haven't heard me talk about it before, I usually find that November is ironically the hardest month of the year. My theory is that trials remind you how grateful for the things that you still have going right. I used to have a plethora of other crazy theories but Dave helps calm the fire I build within my own anxious walls. I spent a lot of the day studying and worrying because....

Tuesday I took my final. Yes, my final final for my undergrad experience with BYU was Tuesday November 19th, 2013. I'm a horrible test taker, I had been looking forward to this day for so long but I still am confused why I chose Statistics as my last class seeing as it was probably my least favorite from my college experience. Well, I know there were a lot of people out there rooting for me to do well...and I'm not sure if I made you proud. I started out very strong but I soon double guessed and triple guessed every answer I wrote. Soon, minute long questions turned into 45 minute problems and the test took me 5 hours. I remember turning in my test, I thought I would have a huge relief and burden lifted from my shoulders but I had quite the opposite effect. I cried. The tears silently streamed down my face as I rode the subway home during rush hour. To my relief, no one really stared at me as I cried for the hour and a half ride home. I didn't know if I got a high enough test score to pass the class and I know that the score I would get didn't reflect how hard I worked this semester (which has been a constant hardship for me during schooling.) I did the first mind numbing thing I found, I saw a lady playing "candy crush" so I downloaded the game and played it to get my mind off of my life.

Wednesday was early morning production, whatever I had done the last few days to recover from the flu was useless since we shot all day in the blistering cold weather. I LOVE production though so it wasn't as horrible as it could have been. We went to Taylor's house to shoot the beginning and his parents are LDS so I was immediately introduced as the Mormon. I felt very comfortable in the house so I'm great with that. Then we had to made an Indian reservation look like Las Vegas for the kill scene which was a bit far fetched.  I am glad that the gang made a fire before they decided to be so vicious because every 20 minutes the crew could run over to the fire and huddle around it to warm up frozen fingers. 210 was a great episode because we had a boom operator (I picked apart that man's brain about being a freelance sound guy,) I got to run slate and 2nd AC responsibilities with second camera in the woods so I had a lot of energy and excitement for such a cold, late hour shoot. It was wonderful.

Thursday was more of a relaxing day, I felt weird not having to do any homework. I mainly snuggled Champ and Dave as we talked about our dreams for the future and what to make for dinner. Dave and I went to a huge mall as well to shop for Josh's birthday gift. We got distracted by massage chairs, uniqlo outfits, shoes and puppies but eventually found him a perfect gift. We gave him an ugly Christmas sweater for his wine bottles. I hope he liked it.

Friday all of Frenemies were out of the office and they tried to let me have the day off too but I stayed for a few reasons. I wanted to catch up a bit on the huge binder and I had told Angelica (another intern) that I'd go to Micaela's (another intern) benefit concert. I found out in the morning that Angelica went on a production shoot with Stalked so she said she would meet me in the Bronx. I was fine about it until Maron freaked me out that I was going to die and be chopped up into little pieces if I went there alone so I asked Micaela if I could leave with her even though she was leaving super early. It was a great decision, she knew where she was going, I didn't focus on getting lost or any other thing I happen to worry about and we got to talk a lot. It was good to see the perspective of another intern. She works on Frenemies as well but she does more of the research and pre-production aspects of it. So we talked about the day she got a phone call from one of the characters in prison to talk with her (scary, I know.) She goes to a school called Mount St. Vincent which is one of the prettiest campus's I've ever seen. She literally lives in a tower right off of the Hudson river. I guess the students don't like the school very much there but I thought it was GORGEOUS. It was fun to see them practice before the concert started too, I miss self run singing broadway reviews. I also love to observe people and this was a great chance to do it. I worried about Angelica though because she didn't show up before the show started AND her phone ran out of battery. She got there to see the last three songs and I could tell she felt really bad about it but I was just happy that someone asked me to do something (I'm pretty game for any group hangouts.) I also knew she was making much more of a sacrifice than I was, she was shooting in Sparta, she traveled to the Bronx and then traveled back to Staten Island....that's determination. After the show, the three of us went to get "drinks" (shirley temple's save my life) and it was really nice to get to know these two girls. They were very different from each other but I felt like I could connect with both of them individually. We talked until we almost missed our bus back into the city (that would have been VERY bad seeing as it was the last bus leaving that night) and Angelica and I talked a ton on the bus. She reminds me of Ana Chavarri a lot but with a thick New York accent instead of an Ecuadorian one. Driving down 5th Avenue at midnight a week before Thanksgiving is MAGICAL. There are so many lights and I'm taking Dave there when we get back from Thanksgiving because I haven't seen something so romantic since Europe. 12:20am in New York City is not late I guess. There were a lot of people roaming the streets which really helped me feel safe. I said my goodbyes to Angelica and made it on time for my last bus home to Bloomfield. I still don't know what I would've done if I got stuck in the Bronx or in the Port Authority Bus Terminal. Angelica didn't get home until 2:10am, that's crazy.

Saturday, I felt like Dave wanted to go in the city but he wouldn't admit it, plus I needed to rest. Someday I might actually get over this cold. He noticed I wasn't the most chipper version of myself so he sent me on a run, that genius. Runs always help my attitude. We had a hot date to Target, we saw crazy runaway carts hit cars and then walked around the store talking about everything under the sun. The girls from the night before told me they had to make binders about their experience at Atlas so I decided I wanted to make a binder about our experience here in NY so we originally went to Target for a simple binder. The sheet protectors are twice as much as the binder so now I have a binder without anyway to store all of my doo dad's inside, we'll figure it out.

Today, I forgot my tithing for church again and even though I don't recommend this to most people I felt like I should go home and get it during Sunday school. When I got back and finished writing everything down on the tithing slip, the sister giving the lesson got up and said, "Today we're going to talk about the importance of tithing." So hopefully I did the right thing. Dave has been sleeping since church, I fear the worst....he may indeed be catching the never ending sickness.

I believe in new friends, public transportation and binders.

Brooklyn (unedited)

and other Spikey Objects

On Monday I went to Harlem for Equipment returns.

On Tuesday I took 4 TESTS. Took me 5 1/2 hours. It did not feel like a day off. I took the test at the Manhattan LDS institute, the missionaries would look at me oddly when they walked by because I often did jumping jacks and there were several deaf investigators in the office (whom I deeply wanted to sign with but wasn't allowed since I was taking tests for a super long time.) I have to be completely finished with my Statistics class by November 19 to officially graduate and it took seven weeks for my first test to get here. So that's the story. My final is on November 19, if any of you want to pray for this girl here.

On Wednesday I made a wardrobe breakdown and filed receipts (oh joy.) I also forgot a lunch for the first time since I got here so I chose a random place to eat. Wok to Walk turned out to be much better than I had originally anticipated. I wasn't going to start another book until after my Statistics class but I couldn't help but snag a cheap copy of Jane Eyre.

On Thursday I ran 6.5 miles in the rain. Dave went to the gym when I did it because he didn't want to run but I guess it wasn't raining in Clifton so he didn't know I was getting drenched. We also watched Kate and Leopold (based in New York) which was my favorite movie when I was 14 and Dave LOVED it, he was hesitant at first but ended up yelling for joy at the romantic parts.

Friday was November 8, I met Dave five years ago on this day at a Latin Dance. He wouldn't dance with me then so I was determined to go to a dance this evening. I found a dance but it ended up being for people older than 50 (HOW AM I SO BAD AT FINDING PARTIES?!) so we ditched that idea. I fell asleep super early and woke up 4 hours later, then I couldn't fall asleep again until 5:30 where I was woken by the sounds of an 11 year old playing the clarinet. At least I was grateful for my dear parents who endured me learning 6 DIFFERENT INSTRUMENTS in my youth.

Saturday Dave and I went into the city. We walked through Central Park (still absolutely gorgeous right now btw.) We went through the Natural History Museum (I was hoping to see Ben Stiller but unfortunately didn't get to.) We entered the Broadway lottery for Matilda and WON. I never win anything so it was a pretty big deal. We went to the closest cheapest restaurant and I randomly got to see my dear friend Katie Burdick who was only in the city for a day-trip. MATILDA WAS AMAZING! I'm glad dave has finally seen a play in which there was phenomenal acting, phenomenal music, and phenomenal messages. I was very pleased that it was clean and absent of the big league cuss words (that means a lot to me) because then you can really enjoy the pure talent without the cheap tricks. It got out at 10:39 so we ran to the bus to catch it on time. We were there by 10:44 but the bus had ALREADY LEFT, I'm still angry that they left early, it wasn't fair.

I believe in children.

JFK

They were passing out reprints of the newspaper from when JFK was assassinated to promote the National Geographic movie "Killing Kennedy" which will be premiering on the 50th anniversary of his death.....so I guess it's time you know that secretly I'm obsessed with the JFK assassination.

National Geographic and Broadway

Monday was Dave's birthday, yipee! I had to work all day, Boo. I went to a movie with him since that was his only request from me that day, it ended up being so much better than I thought it would be.

Tuesday, the original plan was to go to the statue of Liberty and then try to win the lottery for a broadway play. It was supposed to rain so we decided not to become a lightning target, went into the city seeking old book stores, exploring 30 Rockefeller, NBC studios until we quite easily got tickets to a broadway play titled "First Date" starring Zachary Levi (an old COW of mine.)

On Wednesday I got to work with National Geographic. It was so much fun it barely felt like work. I basically was in charge of finding an interesting climatologist or storm chaser. I found out so much stuff  on how to survive a tornado or a hurricane. I also found out: 95 people commit suicide a day (that's 1 person every fifteen minutes,) a famous storm chaser died this last May in a tornado in Oklahoma, Stu from the Weather Channel only got into weather because he was severely afraid of thunderstorms growing up and there is a real disease where people have severe phobia of natural disasters. Some of my sisters may say I have that disease.

Thursday was a relaxing day, we ran in the rain. We were in charge of making dinner (hopefully that went over well, they at least pretended to like it.) We unpacked officially. We smurfed with friends back home. I did Maddie's make-up for a fashion show....if you feel like calling me to motivate me to do my class, that would be SO good. I cannot find it in me to do the class and it has to be done in two months. That's terrifying.

Friday I went to work, learned about the Mafia and a cool iPhone security system and then rushed home because we were going to my dear sister KIMBERLY NOORLANDER's house (+ family.) It's only a three hour drive but it was a little spooky considering we had come from a city with houses stacked on each other to the dense forest of upstate NY. It was very dark, very different and had a feeling of Halloween already.

Saturday, we went to Cooperstown New York which is the famous baseball capital of the world. We also went to an apple orchard, got cozy hot chocolate, played some Disney Sorry and went to town eating Thai food. Very cozy, very Noorlander like. We love it here and that we're so close to them.

Today we went to church and then came back a tad bit early to get ready to surprise Dave for his birthday with his favorite foods. On the way home Dave found a kitten that all of the kids fell in love with and forgot to run inside before Dave could go inside. So Dave walked inside and was just confused since he didn't know anyone had a birthday near his birthday but his own personal brownie dish reassured him that it was a celebration in memorandum for him. They have a great trail in the back, I don't know if I've seen anything so beautiful in my life. Basically, it was very eventful, I loved this whole week, I want to remember it but it probably seems dry since I'm writing it all down as fast as I can.

Week 2 in NYou

Dave and I are trying to pick up tennis because it seems like an east coast thing to do. Though sometimes I feel like Serena Williams after a good hit, I realize fully that our usual response from observers are laughing or being pointed at during whispers. Sometimes our tennis fiasco's just turn into what is described best in this status:
"I thought I was hearing the songs of humpback whales coming from the TV in the other room. I looked over expecting to see a nature documentary and instead found women's tennis."-Jonathan Struhs

Atlas Media Corp has been amazing, I really opened up this week. I transcribed mostly on Wednesday but on Friday they asked if I wanted to go on production which I responding in a resounding YES (trying hard not to seem too desperate.) I was going to try and do mainly post work while I was here to see if I want to stick with post-production but I can't seem to run away from my love of production work.

On Friday, I had to get up at 5am to catch the 6am bus (4am Utah time.) I know it usually takes some time to get used to a new crew so I focused in the morning to try and remember everything I learned about reading people from Sundance. This is the big leagues, seeing as I was working with the Discovery Channel (ID to be specific) and I was quite nervous that this would make or break whether or not I'd be able to do production at this company again. I think it went really well! It is so much easier for me to thrive and be myself while doing production work than in any other situation in my life. I feel so weird saying that because I don't want to seem like I'm full of myself.

It's hard when you're the new one because you don't know if it would be best to hang out around production just in case anyone needs anything or if you'd be in the way. I took a risk and stuck on set. I'm an extra in one of the scenes and I feel like I must of been somewhat approachable because it was surprisingly easy to talk with everyone on set. The best part of my day is when I accidentally overheard the director tell the AD that they want to request me to come on production with them whenever possible. Also, it was very flattering when they said to me at the end of the night, "you've been such an asset on set. Thank you so much for your hard work! If you find yourself not doing anything tomorrow, you are welcome to join us again!"

I would have taken them up on that offer but my sleep schedule has been really whack. I'll sleep 3 hours for 4 nights in a row and then over 12 hours the next night. I don't recommend this method. This problem has only happened to me once in another time of my life and I felt like it was caused by extreme anxiety.

We have a dog in the house, whom I absolutely adore. He'll come wake me up in the mornings and snuggle me when I'm finishing a book. Unfortunately, I am also very allergic to him. I will not let this stand in my way of the new friend but I do have to figure out the runny nose.

We don't know which ward we are supposed to go to. The first week we went to a branch which was very small but I really liked the French speaking. This week we tried the other ward in the district, which was much larger and has Casey Brey McDaniel is in it! At first, I reverted back to my 13 year old self and felt like running away but Dave forced me to say hello and she recognized me immediately.

Tomorrow is Dave's birthday. We live in a birthday celebratory household so I'm a little nervous about it. 

Katie and Brent

Hey look! It's our couple friends, (our only couple friends but we really wish we had more) and they finally tied the knot!

These two are hilarious, I loved doing their wedding video. I lost a bet. In a good way though, three years ago Dave bet me that Brent would marry the first person he kissed (not in a play) and I took that bet...and lost but I'm so happy that he found Katie. They are perfect for each other. 

Billionaires

At the party of all parties we played a game that if all expenses paid, what would we get each other for our birthdays? Here are our presents:

Presents for DAVE:

• A full body wax-from Linda
• A labradoodle-from Himself
• A yellow lab, a home by the lake, a wood watch, all of the shoes he could even think of wanting to buy and a european cruise-from me
• Tickets to E3-from Dan Lewis
• I'd pay his parking ticket so he can go to Wisconsin-from Katie
• A lake-from Papa
• A boy- from Saide (age 3)
• A motorcycle with built in guns-from Seth (age 10)
• Apple-from Buddy (age 13)
• A football shirt-from Eden (age 8)
• A waterballoon  on his face-from Mary (age 10)
• I'd drop all of my money on him in ones, as a prank-from Kim
• A bow-from Anna (age 8)
• The Nike franchise and all the equipment and toys-from Mama E

Presents for LIZI:

• A baby bedroom set-from Linda
• A ranch with horses-from Dave
• An Oscar winning film starring Dan Lewis- from Dan
• A horse camp to run-from Katie
• A horse farm-from Papa
• A birdie-from Sadie (age 3)
• A steeler's shirt-from Andrew (age 8)
• A bomb-from Seth (age 10)
• Microsoft-from Buddy (age 13)
• An art set-from Eden (age 8)
• A billiondollar camera-from Mary (age 10)
• A horse farm and studio-from Kim
• A head band-from Anna (age 8)
• I'd buy her Sundance, all of it- from Mama E

Presents for our UNBORN CHILD: 

(no this is not an announcement)

• A baby bjorn with a camera attachment-from Linda
• A labradoodle-from Dave
• A running stroller-from Lizi
• The gift of my name-from Dan
• A night-nanny-from Katie
• A house-from Papa
• A phone-from Sadie (age 3)
• A toy-from Andrew (age 8)
• A mini gun-from Seth (age10)
• Mars-from Buddy (age 13)
• Baby Clothes-from Eden (age 8)
• A mini car-from Mary (age 10)
• Tickets to visit their favorite Aunt Kim-from Kim
• A dress-from Anna
• An entourage of family and friends to help in every way-from Mama E

A Revelation

There is something that I absolutely love about Sundance to the core and it's not what you would expect either.
Yes, it's fun to be able to beat everybody at ping pong because they are super drunk.
Yes, I love the people I am meeting and the fact that so many went to Full Sail (which was the university I was really hoping to go to before I was convinced not to apply.)
Yes, it is amazing to be with people who have such incredible work ethic.
Despite all of it, my biggest scariest part about starting this internship was I worried that they were all coming to my turf. Let's just say, there seems to be a pattern in my life when people come to Utah and then all I hear are complaints about this place. Do you know how heartbreaking it is that I automatically expect that reply now? Well, guess what.
The people who come to the Sundance Labs LOVE Utah. They appreciate the beauty. They appreciate the history. They don't necessarily like the price of alcohol but they get over that. They respect that I don't do all of the same activities as them and yet I feel accepted.

Main point, I hear the kindest words about Utah from those I've met through Sundance and it fills me with a pride I've been longing for.

Spring Fever

CHERIE 25 Habillage from MATHEMATIC SAS on Vimeo.

I've got spring fever. How about you?

If I Could Take Pictures in Church

There are a lot of times I wish I could take pictures in church but today it definitely would have been when I was teaching Primary. Last night, Dave and I had a late Macey's run and I realized I had to teach today so I grabbed some stickers and had a really horrible idea which I'm glad I didn't do.

Remember the story about the puppets with dots and stars titled You Are Special? The puppets that did something good received star stickers and those that weren't awesome received dot stickers. Well, that was my idea for singing time. Good, not great. During Sacrament meeting, I realized how rude and horribly wrong it could go and panicked a bit. Instead of giving them dots when they sang badly, I just had them get stars if they sang at all and if they didn't sing, I got to put on a sticker.You'd laugh out loud if I had pictures of some of the creative designs the kids ended up with.

We had sticker goatees, stickers boogers, sticker eyebrows, sticker fingernails and lines of stickers right down the middle of their face. I had my rainbow bright sticker and let the kids decorate the rest of me after the activity. Then, some very confused parents.

Pat Fiso

Pat Fiso from Fesler Films on Vimeo.

Pat Fiso passed away last week and I had a great opportunity to visit her with my camera a couple of months ago. I love her sweet soul and I think it is evident in this film what she holds as her highest priority.

I believe in the after-life.

This was my brother-in-laws status today:

After three years on the job market, 144 job applications, 126 rejection letters, 18 conference & telephone interviews, 13 more rejection letters, 5 campus interviews, & 4 more rejection letters, today I received & accepted a tenure-track job offer. New York here we come!

I am thrilled! I always knew that one of us would end up in New York and Kim definitely has always been the traveler of the family. This also shows how hard it is to find jobs though, the right one said yes but does that scare anyone about the economy's future? I mean, I may have overdone it for internships and I may not have even one internship say yes to me but I feel that it will be ten times harder with searching for full-time employment. Danny is overqualified with his resume, he is an AMAZING teacher, he may get nervous for interviews but when you really care about something, don't you get nervous? Anyway, my family is very excited about this opportunity for them.