My Big Fat Greek Dinner

Yummy, Yummy, Home Made Greek Food

This afternoon, Christian and I drove to Hartford,CT to meet up with some old friends from the University of Utah 1100 Court (our first apartment). Dave and Kim invited us to their place for some home made Greek food. We figured it would be fun to meet up with some old chums, make our first trip to CT, and eat some Greek food which we don't get to eat too often. We were soooo glad we went! The food was awesome! Kim's sister apparently has a tradition of making a Greek dinner each year for Dave's birthday. I really cannot remember the names of anything we ate, but I do know that it was delicious. It was also fun to reminisce about our days in the "Village" (aka UofU student housing) and talk about the old ward, the drama of kids and their kiddie pools, and the grass moms. Those are great memories that both Christian and I will never forget.


Christian loves food! He tried to remember the names of all the food but struggled a bit.


The Greek food eaters!

It was a great trip and we were glad to find some friends less than 2 hours away. On the way home it decided to snow heavily which is not our favorite thing to drive in, but we made it home safely and with full stomaches. Thanks to the Hammonds for inviting us for such a fun and tasty event!
One last picture. This little boy was so tired and when his parents were trying to leave he decided he would just go where the dog sleeps to try to take a nap. It made me laugh...

Happy Christmas 2007

I must first admit that I did wake up at 4 in the morning on Christmas day. In my defense, because, hey "I'm just a caveman!", I was actually a little disoriented and thought it was later. I easily fell back asleep and didn't wake up again until after 8. (this is Christian posting by the way).
Christmas was so relaxing and easy-going. It was especially wonderful to hear from all of our family. We didn't hear from the Daytons though, but, I did talk to Lyman two nights previous. One of the big highlights was hearing how excited Dad Gentry was to receive the Chickens of America calendar. Laci picked it out at Curious George (in Harvard Square) and said "your dad will totally love this!" Well, I am sure he did. We are also happy to hear that Stevie, Laci's brother, really loved all of his Batman gear.
After lounging around for awhile, and crashing from the sugar rush (speaking of which, stay tuned for a story forthcoming about sugar rushes and what not) we got from our monkey bread and fruit breakfast, we got ourselves ready to go to the Plants for dinner. It was a lot of fun. You can see the fun album with all of the great commentary. So, Presley (the Plant's little girl) was totally hopped up on sugar. She got her wish, which she told us on Sunday, to get "canny" for Christmas. She spent most of the evening wandering around with a glazed over zombie-look. It was funny to see her continue to shove chocolate pie in her mouth as her eyes were fighting of the downward spiral of the end of a sugar high. Eventually, she ended up asleep on the couch, oblivious to all of the Christmas toy commotion---Noah (the Plant's oldest) playing with his super heroes and Josh yacking it up about politics and his "research." The dinner was great, and we were thankful that the Plants had us come over to be a part of their home at Christmas.
BTW, friends and family, Laci got a guitar for Christmas. Any suggestions as to what DVD's she should get that give her hands on training?
Stay tune for a coming attraction of some of our home movies that will be coming soon, as soon as we get the 4-6 pin Firewire cable for which I have been searching high and low. Take care and we hope that your holiday was safe and beautiful. Happy New Year!

A Happy Christmas Eve

It was an eventful Christmas here around the Gentry house. After Christian's crazy weekend of holiday work at Williams-Sonoma, it was time to start the Christmas festivities. Sunday was the Ward Christmas program. It went rather well, considering several choir members were missing, due to the program happening a week later than anticipated(See "White Christmas" post below). Most of what was done with the ward choir was out of the Oxford 100 Carols for Choir (Wilcocks and Rutter). Since most of the pieces are accompanied by organ, I had to be creative with my improvisational piano chops. This basically translates to me leaving out the tenor part 70% of the time. But, it went well and I think people felt the Spirit, or at least, a rowdy primary kid punching them in the back.

On Christmas Eve we invited a bunch of friends over to enjoy some food, Yankee Swap and Christmas Caroling. It was a lot of fun. Above is a little slideshow with captions that probably reek of inside jokes. I apologize in advance. Click on the album or here to get the full view with captions and stuff.

Happy Holidays!

Happy Holidays! We just wanted to send Christmas greetings to all of friends and family. We feel so fortunate to have such wonderful and supportive families. It is hard to be so far away from everyone but we want you to know we miss and love you all! We're very lucky to have so many wonderful friends as well. It is amazing as we move around this country how many amazing friendships we have been able to make and maintain. We truly feel that we have been touched by so many of you for good!
It has been a very busy and eventful year.
I would never have thought we could fall in love with a place called Louisville, KY so much! The two years we were there went by so fast and we so blessed to have stopped there for a short time. Louisville was such a good place to us. I truly miss our friends there and the not so snowy winters!
As many of you can imagine my mother was not happy at all to find out that Christian chose to go to a PhD program even farther away from Utah, out here in Boston, MA. (You cannot really get much further!) Moving to a big city has been much more difficult for me than my dear husband. Now that I have a GPS and have had some time to adjust things are going great here. I was lucky to find the job I did, even though it didn't happen as quickly as I would have hoped. Christian is loving his program at Brandeis and all the comp students are such great supports and friends to one another. Christian has so many opportunities at Brandeis and we are grateful that he has this chance to develop his talents with such great people. We have some of the best neighbors and friends out here and are excited to be here for the next 4 1/2 years.
We are so happy there is a time of year when we can think about doing a little more service for one another, being a little less selfless, think of family, friends and good food. But most of all a time when we can really turn our thoughts to our Savior and his miraculous entrance to earth and all the wonderful things he did while he was here.
Merry Christmas! Hope you all have a Happy and Drama free holiday!

White Christmas

After spending the last two years in Louisville, KY with no snow and very brown Christmases, the snow has been quite a shock to all our systems! It is definitely not going to be a brown Christmas this year. Last Thursday it snowed 8 inches in 7 hours. I was let out of work @ 2:30 in order to get home safely, this would have been great had not every business in the Boston area also been let out at the same time. VERY luckily I decided to take the subway that day and was able to get home in an hour without any problems. This was not the case for all the people in the city of Boston who drove home. Many of my co-workers were stuck in traffic 5-7 hours on a commute that usually takes them 20-40 minutes. Many children were stuck on school buses for 3-5 hours. It was a pretty crazy day for most of the city. Christian and I had a great day. I got home at 3:30 and we watched a movie, made vegetable soup, played in the snow with McDuff and took it easy. It was pretty crazy to watch it snow that much that fast. This was McDuff's first experience with snow more than 1/2 inch deep so it was pretty funny to see how he reacted. I walked him around and in spots the snow was as deep as he is tall and he was swimming through the snow. McDuff is not a big fan of the snow but we are hoping that with time he will adjust as it doesn't show signs of stopping.



Just when the streets got drivable it of coarse starts snowing again. Luckily the snow started after Christian's big concert @ Brandeis with the Hartt school on Saturday night. The snow began early Saturday morning and snowed just enough to cancel church. It snowed about another 2-3 inches and then started raining and the wind was something fierce. So today has become another lazy day of sleeping in, making cookies, eating a good breakfast, watching Transformers and just chillin'!
So thanks to the snow I have had 1/2 a day of work and no church this week. It has been bitterly cold here and locals are saying it doesn't usually get this cold until January so I am not sure what that means. Perhaps a lot of days spent inside and not working, that might not be too bad!
Speaking of a White Christmas, Christian bought us tickets to see the White Christmas musical this Wednesday. It should be a fun date and get us excited for the holiday season.

McDuff doesn't like the white stuff but he sure does love Christmas. The main reason he loves Christmas is because he gets to unwrap presents. He opened his treats from our neighbor Charlotte and he loved it. He is amazingly good at opening presents, you really wouldn't believe it. It is so cute!
We are excited to be spending our first Christmas together in Boston, we think it will be fun! We hope all of you are enjoying your holiday season! We miss everyone!

Wreath Making at its Finest!

Last night was the 43rd annual Cambridge 1st ward Wreath Making Party!!! Wahoo! Of coarse this was my 1st time attending and I wasn't really sure if I had the skills it would take to make the wreath. I had faith that someone there would be able to help me out and make this special night a success for me.
I brought my neighbor, Charlotte with me. She lives across the street from us and is so great! Charlotte has been such a wonderful neighbor; she lets us park our car in her driveway (which is one of the best gifts a Bostonian could recieve), she makes us food all the time, she buys McDuff scooby snacks, she even cuts out coupons for his bones each week. We have been hanging out a lot with Charlotte lately, for family home evening this week her niece taught us how to play scrabble. Her niece plays in Scrabble tournaments all over the country and I just cant believe that the game is not at all about spelling!! Who knew? So this is my new favorite thing to do! On Tuesday Charlotte had her friend come to her house and give us a manicure for only $10! So as you can tell Charlotte takes care of us and we love her for it. I digress.....so I invited Charlotte to the wreath making party.
Charlotte was a big hit, she was just so excited to see all the young pregnant ladies and cute babies. There was a dinner there with soups and salads and she wanted to try all of them so she could tell me which one was the best. She couldn't decide and which one however and decided they were all good.
Then came the wreath making! I had no idea what I was doing, but my FABULOUS visiting teacher Alison showed me how to do this crazy New England tradition.

This is Charlotte, Lisa and I starting our wreaths...not too shabby!

Surprisingly, the wreath wasn't too difficult and we all came out winners with beautiful and wonderful smelling wreaths for our door!


Tada!

It ended up being a wonderful event. I was happy that Charlotte could come with me and had such a great time. I am also very glad that my wreath looks so awesome hanging on my door! Just look at that beauty!


A special thanks goes out to my wonderful hubby who made home made vegetable beef soup for the even because I didn't get a chance to do it. If you didn't know...my husband is a total ROCK STAR!!! Everyone loved the soup babe!! Thanks! (even Charlotte thought it was very tasty!)

Fun Filled Thanksgiving Weekend!

This year for Thanksgiving we stayed in Boston and even hosted the big event at our home. Yes, we made our very first turkey without any help (besides over the phone help from Wonder Chef Maren) from anyone. We invited a couple from our ward over and a couple that lives down the street. Everyone contributed to the meal so we didn't have to make everything so that was great. Oh yeah, listen to this, our neighbors upstairs left for the holiday but before they left they brought us a pumpkin cheesecake from Rosie's Bakery that was soooo delicious! I am so thankful for them!!! Isn't that so nice? I thought it was. The meal turned out very well and we all left the table filling more than satisfied. All in all we had a really fun time. It was fun to cook with Christian and share the holiday with friends. After we stuffed our faces we looked at all the adds for Black Friday and loathed over the toys we would like but are too poor to buy, it is a fun tradition we have each year. I have yet to find a deal to get me to Kohls or Target at 4:00 a.m. however!

On Friday I had to work which was no fun, but I did it so I could take Monday off cause my dad and his girlfriend, Lori came to town to visit us!!! They arrived in Boston Friday night and we ate yummy food at Red Bones and then went Candle Pin Bowling. For those of you Non New Englanders that is a game similar to bowling except the pins are really thin and you use really small balls to try to knock down the pins. You get three turns and only two times in two games was I able to get all the pins down. It is so much harder than it looks. We all had a great time laughing at ourselves and how ridiculous we looked trying to master the game.
Saturday it was FREEZING!!!! We all bundled up really warm and took a Duck Boat Tour of Boston,if you don't know what a duck boat is please see picture below. They go on land and on sea and it was really fun to see Boston that way and a lot warmer than walking around!


After the Duck Boat tour we drove to Charlestown to see Bunker Hill.


This is the Bunker Hill monument and it has 294 stairs that spiral all the way to the top and yes, we climbed to the top, because that "is why we came here." That climb wasn't the easiest thing and my legs were shaking like crazy when we got to the bottom. However, going up 294 stairs on a freezing day is a great way to get really hot, so I guess that worked out in our favor! After that we saw the USS Constitution which was neat as well.

Yeah WE made it!!!

Another fun thing we did while Christian went to school was go to Fenway Park, home to the Boston,Red Sox! Go Sox!


It was really fun to see Fenway and be a part of this historical piece of baseball. We learned a lot about the stadium and the Red Sox. Good times!

Other highlights this weekend:
We put up our first "life sized" Christmas tree. We decided we were grown up enough now to get a big kid tree instead of our 3 foot fiber optic tree. I think it looks great but it is kinda hard to get a good picture.


The best part of my week was getting my very own GPS from my dad for my birthday! The worst part of living in this city for me is trying to find my way around without getting lost witch is really not possible to do! I DO NOT enjoy being lost at all and at times driving has caused major anxiety attacks for me. I am overjoyed with my new toy and I believe I might actually survive in this city now!!! Thanks Dad!

Thanks to my dad and Lori for letting us drag them all over Boston and for all the great food we ate and fun we had. Love you guys!

Two Great Men

This is my Grandpa Evans being saluted by my brother Stevie at a Korean War Memorial in Salt Lake City, 2005.

My Grandpa Evans

Today, two men have been on my mind a lot. One is my grandpa Evans and the other is my brother Stevie.
My grandpa died almost two years ago and today is his birthday. Although he is no longer with us I still think of him often and am influenced by his life and his love toward me constantly. My grandpa taught me so much about unconditional love and hard work. Until the day my grandpa died he was still working hard and never had a thought enter his mind about retirement. He loved to work. He also loved his family, no matter what drama was going on in the family he was always there to put an end to the nonsense. He had/has the respect of everyone in the family and they all listened to him.
As a little girl I spent a lot of time with my grandparents as my parents were working and in school. I remember going to the mall with grandpa to walk and then going back to their house to eat graham crackers and milk. My grandpa always made me feel special and loved. He was there for me whenever I needed him. He was at the hospital when I was sick, he made time to attend special school performances, and always made sure everyone in our large family always had a Christmas present.
My grandpa loved to make people laugh and this talent came naturally to him. He had a way of teasing people and bringing a smile to their face.
Before we left for Louisville, my family would eat Sunday dinner each week with my grandparents and we were able to spend good times with them and create fond memories.
I really miss having my grandpa around, I will always miss him. Love you grandpa!!!

My Brother Stevie

The reason my brother has been on my mind especially today is because he has been serving our country over seas for the past 8 months and his ship the USS Denver will be back in its San Diego port tomorrow. Stevie has been serving in the U.S. Navy for the past three years and will be done with his service this March. His experiences in the Navy have truly polished his hard work ethic and taught him more about respect and friendship. I know it has been hard to be in the middle east the last 8 months as the temperatures were extremely hot and being on a ship with limited AC did not help the situation. Many times he talked about he food and how they had the same thing day in and day out and how he longed just to have a PB and J sandwich, something that is readily available to us Americans. I am so proud of him and the way he has served his country. He has sacrificed much time away from his family, his new bride and two daughters that had a difficult time understanding where daddy was and why he was there. I am thankful for Stevie's safe deployment and that no harm came to him or his shipmates. I wish I could be there tomorrow to see his ship come in, but that cant happen. I know he will be surprised to see not only his wife and children but will be surprised when my mom and grandma show up as well. Love you bro!

Pie Making

The Finished Product

Christian and I went to our first cooking club in our ward last night. There were about 16 people there learning how to makes pies. Christian, I have to admit was most dedicated to making the crust and filling, while I was mostly interested in socializing and eating the final product. Christian loves to makes pies but this was his first cream pie, it is chocolate cream pie and it is soooo YUMMY! Thanks to Barbara who helped us make such delicious food at her beautiful home. We look forward to next months cooking club where we will be making truffles and toffee! mmmmmmm. Don't worry we didn't eat the whole pie, we shared with the neighbors and friends. If anyone needs a great recipe for pie crust or cream pie just let us know!

Hope all of you have a wonderful and delicious Thanksgiving!



So good!

What are the boys up to?

Many of you guys may be wondering how Christian and McDuff spend their time while I am hard at work all day. This pictures says it better than any words I can write!


Any Questions?

Red Sox Rally Rowdiness!

Posters at the Rally!

There has been a lot of excitement in Boston with the Red Sox going to the World Series and Sweeping the Colorado Rockies! Christian and I are both happy the series ended fast because the games were on pretty late in our time zone and we were getting a little tired staying up late and getting up early for work. We realized soon, however, that it was not just us walking around like zombies, it was the whole city. So yes, we decided we are OFFICIALLY Red Sox Fans, we wanted to share this news with everyone! We came to the conclusion that we cant live here for the next 5 years and not be fans, after all these are the most die hard fans we have ever seen and we want to be part of it!
When the Red Sox won the series the city of Boston has a "Rally"/Parade for the team through the city. It was on a Tuesday @noon and I had to work so I couldn't go, but Christian didn't have school so he decided to head down for the festivities. One may think that not to many people can attend due to work and school but I think 80% of the city called in sick to work and skipped class to be a part of this historic event!


Jacoby Ellsburry is the Center Fielder and one of the fastest guys on the team. Don't you just wish your name was Coco Crisp?

During the Rally the players went down the streets of Boston on the duck boats and waved at the fans. Pretty exciting stuff. Many folks in town took this as an opportunity to be drunk by noon which led to a few people in the crowd being arrested, one of which Christian got to see!
We have really enjoyed the excitement of the events and look forward to following the team that beat the curse!
Go Sox!

Pandora

I have found one of my favorite new websites and I want to share the joy it brings me with the rest of you!
So I love to jam out to my tunes in the morning and while I am getting ready, when I am doing the dishes, or just checkin' the world wide web. But if you are like me, sometimes you get board with the music that you have on i tunes and you are too poor to go and purchase more music from the i tunes music store (I know $.99 is not a lot but I cant just buy one song!) So Christian introduced me to this awesome website http://www.pandora.com Here you can create your own radio stations for FREE!!! I love cool stuff that is free! You just put in an artist or a song that you like and it will come up with a play list of songs that are of the similar genre and it just plays and plays for hours. You can have as many stations as you want it is so great. So it is like listening to the radio with perks. Perk #1 No commercials (YEAH!) Perk #2 You can skip a song if you don't like it. Perk #3 It is totally FREE!
So check it out and let me know what you think. It has brought a great deal of joy to our lives and hope it will do the same for you!

Happy Halloween

Western Mass

Berkshires, BoSox...and, yup, the RMV

I guess this will be the first time I have tried my hand at our family blog. I actually have to really hustle with this. I am told by trusted sources, that our blog posts are actively read, criticized, laughed at and sometimes pooped on. I have had to resist the temptation to make every word a link (which I call HTdoubleB, or HyperTextBarfBack). All html-related biznazz aside, it is time to hunker down and blog away.

First off, glad to hear that the Keer-wans are fine and not melting in Land o' Diego. I hope they didn't bring that wildfire badluck with them to Show Low. The days of the Rodeo fire would not be fun to reenact (i.e. load up the pickup Jeremy and don't forget Dad's love of his life--the piano). Is pickup truck two words or three? Could never figure that out. As long as another "damn rodeo" doesn't happen things should be fine out there.

Laci is busy at Ethos. She is trying to find a work buddy with whom she can bond. She tends to buddy up and create tons of inside jokes to the point that the inside jokes are inside the inside jokes. Make sense? Not to me. It got to a point that when I would attend get-togethers with her co-workers where my silly question of "What do you mean?" would be answered by a "It will take to long to explain." That is cool though. I have tons of lame-o inside jokes myself that only Bartók might find only somewhat amusing, when they are not at his expense. Silly thing is that my insides aren't much into joking--just passing gas and causing great amounts of phlegm to explode out of me when I sneeze. I am still waiting for the day where one of my monster sneezes happens in front of a class room full of bright-eyed (stoned) college students. Fortunate for me, my Old Faithful Geyser-like sneezes have only occurred at home or while camping. Grateful am I that we don't live in a camper trailer. Speaking of which, Laci and I were discussing what grown-up toys we would prefer to have--you know like, jet skis, boats, campers, four-wheelers, etc. I really don't know what I would wish to own. You see, when you own something big, like a boat, for instance, that means you have to take care of it and use it and pay for it. All of which seem to suck all of the fun out of the idea. So, I pose the question for you? If money were no option, what recreational stuff would you like to own? I am subtly trying to get some comments going.

As far as events around here, i cover a lot of them with my lil' podcast that is linked later. I like the podcast idea, it should be a lot of fun. You have to here the podcast for the RMV story. Tonight, we are going to eviscerate some pumpkins, light their brains on fire and put the skulls on our front porch for everyone to see. The flames should shine through the eye sockets and hollow, soulless mouth. How exciting is that?!? Pictures will be soon to come.

In other news, I have learned that the Red Sox Nation isn't just a website. It is an actual group of crazy people that are only truly happy when the Red Sox are winning. It is crazy how nice everybody is right now. People aren't swearing at you for driving like a Kentuckian (fixed that actually by changing our plates), they actually smile and wave back when you are waving at your friend behind them, they help you at the store by saying "Get it yourself, it is down two aisles," instead of "Get lost yourself, the exit is two aisles away." It is great to see everybody so happy. Just in case, though, (i am not trying to jinx things here), we are getting our food storage ready and our deadbolts fixed. Who knows what will happen if things don't go as planned (yes, they are already talking about a sweep). Well, I add my barbaric cheer to the throng of fellow parishioners, yet, it is disingenuous. Deep in my heart I am always going for the underdog. The Red Sox left that status three years ago. Objectively speaking, it is the Rockies turn to do it. But, for my own health and safety I will keep those thoughts to myself.
This is our first podcast. It is boring, but fun nonetheless. Music credits include Beirut, Deerhoof and Yours Truly (not a band, just music by me, Christian). Most importantly is the awesome piano playing of Jihye Chang---pianist extraordinaire!

McDuff

McDuff goes for a new look!

Many of you have been asking for updates on McDuff so I wanted to give everyone the dirt. McDuff has been a great sport in our transition to Boston. He didn't really love the ride in the Buget truck for 17 hours but as long as he was on his mommies lap things seemed to go better.
He has adjusted to his new home and not having a sliding glass window to look out every day but he has found plenty of other ways to access windows. He was sad to leave all of his squirrel friends in KY but luckily he has made many new squirrel friends here in Somerville. They love to get into our trash and it just drives McDuff crazy to watch them do so. He is enjoying having is own backyard where he can roam outside with out a leash, he does however love his leash time because it means that he gets to go on a walk or a ride with his mom and dad.
McDuff is a big hit with our elderly neighbors. They LOVE him and he has scored 2 huge bags of bones from his new beloved friends! They think he is the most well behaved dog they have ever seen and we cant disagree with that!
Overall, McDuff still does a lot of sleeping, snuggling, tricks for treats, and playing with his squirrel toy.
We will see how he likes the Boston winters as he has only seen snow once in KY and it was not a lot. YIKES!



Boston Rocks!

Salem, MA.....Witch Country

giant, scary, purveyors of death

Shedevil

So we have been waiting to visit Salem until it was October.....and it was well worth the wait!!! The town of Salem is a huge party during the month of October celebrating Halloween, witches, and lots of yummy food. The down side is that there is no where to park except lots that charge you $20!!! Yikes! We made the most of it however! We were able to go to the Salem Wax Museum and even see a witch cast a spell (which was not as exciting and one may think and it was not a mean spell). The witch was very nice but had very immodest clothing on. They had lots of psychics and what not but we did not participate in that. We did enjoy going into all of the cute shops with Halloween decorations and costumes. Many of the people there were even dressed up in their costumes! Christian would not go into the Haunted Houses with me because (he would kill me if he knew I was writing this) he is afraid of them. We were not able to go to the Salem Witch Trial Museum due to long lines and waits, but we will hit that up next time around.
Overall, it was a fun filled day with lots of Halloween festivities. There is just something magical about a place that thinks regular people are witches and hangs them from trees if they wont admit that they are.
This will definitely be a repeat tradition for Halloweens to come! I am sure by the end of 5 years I can convince Christian to go to a Haunted House with me.

Those hands are so daft

The Big E, food services and FINALLY getting a job!

So it has been a busy month here in the Gentry household.
Christian has been attending school two whole days a week thanks to all the wonderful Jewish holidays that he gets off. This has allowed him lots of time to write and work on the various projects he has going on. He always like to take on way more than he can chew, but he always manages to come through with beautiful work after all the blood, sweat and tear. He is an inspiration to us all! He is loving school at Brandeis and is enjoying his fellow composers and professors. He finally got a calling in church to be the accompanist to the ward choir, this he believes will help brush up his site reading skills. (lets hope so!)
Laci has been working her temp job the last three weeks. It has been a VERY interesting experience to say the least. She has been working in the food services department of the Cambridge Public Schools. By the looks of how things went she doesn't think they have ever had a temp that had to many mad skills like she does. They were very impressed with her work of entering in over 3,500 applications for free/ reduced school lunch and mailing out all the letters to the parents letting them know if they were approved or not. It is very exciting work and I can tell that you are all jealous. This opportunity made it possible for Laci to really get down the Boston accent as all the employees are locals and it was quite a treat as you can imagine. On her last day the office bought her 1/2 dozen cupcakes with a nice Thank you card. It really was a blessing for Laci to be earning a little money but more importantly to get her out of the house and give her something to do each day so she didn't go CRAZY! The best news of the month came a week ago when she was FINALLY offered a job! Yeah, applause, cheers! She will be working for a company called ETHOS which works with the elderly population. She will be doing elder protective services and is thrilled to be back doing social work even with a new and exciting population. She has realized that before when people would say to her, "You job must be so fulfilling." she was like sure, yeah it is what I do. But after doing work with is not so much on the fulfilling side she truly understands that social work is fulfilling and she LOVES doing it. She starts her new job on Ocotober 1,2007!
Laci has also joined a soccer team called the Worthless and Weak which is pretty much what the team is but they are doing pretty well considering none have ever played together and many have not played at all. Of coarse Laci has played the staring role as goalie and has had some amazing saves if I do say so myself! She loves to look to the sidelines to see Christian and McDuff cheering her on. It is amazing to see how McDuff stares at his mom the entire game. He knows her movements and his eyes don't leave her at all. So cute!
Laci and Christian recently took a trip to the Big E in West Springfield, MA. What is the Big E you may ask. It is the six New England states fair. it is HUGE and all the fair and fun one could ever want. It was a great time and fun to see what all the other states have to offer.
McDuff is a good boy, he has been enjoying his walks but is nervous about this thing called snow that he hears could stop his outside walks completely! He has won the hearts of all his neighbors and has benefits greatly from the experience by getting lots of love and treats. He still loves to go on car rides, walks and chase the squirls in the backyard. His new favorite activity is going to his mommy's soccer games and watching her run around on a lot of grass. He has gotten into trouble due to the mailman slipping the mail through the door slot and he just couldn't resist from eating it. (Mail just tastes so good!)

All seems to be going well!
Go Red Sox!

Labor Day in Utah

Why do we celebrate Labor Day, does anyone know? I sure don't but I do know that I like days off from work....that is when I am actually working! I decided it would be a good time to visit family since I am not working and they had a long weekend so I went back to my roots, Salt Lake City, Utah! I actually just mentioned to my mom briefly that I wanted to come see her and that was all she needed to hear to get online right then and buy me a ticket. Christian and McDuff had to hold the fort down in Somerville so that I could go play. They were good sports about being left home alone! Poor babies!
It was so much fun to visit with my family again, I didn't realize how much I missed everyone. Seeing them and the beautiful Wasatch Mountains really helped boost my spirits from this hard trial of unemployment! I really needed to take a step back from the situation and enjoy life for a minute and that has made all the difference. While in Utah, I finally got to see my mom and dad's new house in Taylorsville, Utah which is beautiful and big! We had lots of fun laughing, traveling, shopping, eating GREAT food, and watching movies! I also got to play with my two nieces; they have so much energy and I just love being with them. I also got to see some good friends, my old DCFS buddies and I did our traditional lunch at Cafe Rio (there is no place better to eat on earth!) I also got to see my childhood buddies Kara and Stefani. They both have 2 kiddos now!
Below are some pictures from the trip. One of me and my dad, he has the black hair and mustache, while his dad my grandpa in the other photo is the one with grey hair and mustache.
My mom and brother and I are doing a "fashion show, fashion show, fashion show at lunch" (quoted from Kelly on The Office) of her new work hats that we picked up at the Farmers Market. Then there are my two cute nieces, Athena and Cautious, and then my good friend Kara who has been one of my BFF's since I was 5 years old!

From Lexington to Concord

This weekend Christian and I decided to drive the Revolutionary War Trail. There is so much to do and see in this city and we are bound and determined to see as much of it as we can. Anyone who visits the Boston area this is a beautiful drive; the historic homes and scenery is really quite fabulous! There are a few free museums and visitors centers along the drive that are set up very nicely. Christian and I both agree that we learned more about the Revolutionary War in 4 hours that we ever did in any of our schooling. It is kind of sad that schools don't teach much about the founding of our country. It gave me a lot of respect the families who fought to have our country be free. After the Boston Tea Party, England completely closed off the port to Boston, allowing no goods of any type to get to these settlers as a punishment. Outlining cities had to bring them food and water to help them get through these difficult times. There are many great stories about this war really. Here are a few pictures of our trip. I found some really hot minutemen along the trail!

Bostonians are we!

We are officially living in the great state of Massachusetts! It is no doubt the hardest state to spell out of all 50 states if you ask me! Christian and I have been together in Boston for about a month and we are enjoying all the time we have together (considering neither one of us is working or in school currently!). We have had time to check out the city and do some fun things. We had some friends come into town who had a connection with Captain Jack Sparrow and they were able to get us on a sunset sail on the Boston Harbor. It was a beautiful and breathtaking experience.
We also took an hour trip to New Hampshire to go to Hampton Beach. It is a beautiful beach in a cute little town that came right out of a movie. I can see us spending much more time there!
We are really excited about all the adventures that Boston allows us to have! We are getting more used to using our legs than our wheels. We are also getting used to a life without fast food, as there is none in the Cambridge area, and to our little old house that we live in with all of it perks! It is very different that what we are used to but we think we will really enjoy it.
Our ward is a fun one; it is full of young families where one of the spouses is attending Harvard or MIT. So it is very intellectual and I just sit and listen and sometime wonder what people are even talking about. It should be a pretty interesting experience; we look forward to getting callings in this ward and serving soon.
As far as work, Christian will start school and teaching piano at the beginning of September. I am still looking for work on a daily basis. I have applied now for over 85 jobs in the last 5 months. I have had several interviews and I'm hoping that something will work out very soon. Talking to different people at church and around the city it is very difficult to get a job here due to being so densely populated. Many of the students that graduate from the 20+ colleges around here tend to stick around and want jobs as well. We know that we have done everything we can do and that Heavenly Father is looking out for us.
We are excited about this whole blog thing and think it'll be a great way to keep everyone up to date on what is going on!