At the end of September my mom came into town for the Tucson Quilt Show. She loves to quilt and when we found out there was a show in Tucson it wasn't if we would go, but when. It was a lot of fun. While there we picked a few things to be our next projects. I picked two, a cross-stitch pattern that says "The Laundry Room" and also this:
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| bobbiegdesigns.com |
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Usually for our monthly temple trips we go to Mesa. We were planning on going to Mesa a few Fridays ago when Jessica, my sister-in-law, said that she and her family were headed down to the Gila Valley Temple and wanted to know if we would join them. We found out that the hotel they were staying in allowed pets so we were on our way a few hours later with Boomer in tow. Jessica and Marshall had some friends that were also in Safford and they'd volunteered to watch Reve and Lexi. It was nice to go to the temple all together. And the temple was busy! The rooms are really only supposed to hold 40ish people. I think our session had a little over 60. I loved that the temple worker said, "What a pleasant problem to have!"
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| thanks Jess for letting me steal your pictures! |
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This past week I took a trip out to Utah for the annual Hall Girl Party. I found out, however, that I only had to work 1 day last week, so I at last minute changed my flight to fly out 3 days sooner so that I could see my best friend Erika before she moved to New York. I'm so glad I did that!
I was a little nervous however that I wouldn't make it. Sunday, October 9th, I came down with some kind of bug. I. was. ill. My stomach felt like it was eating itself and I had a fever that got up to 102!
Monday morning I called in sick to work, which is a rare thing. I then had James give me a blessing. I told him I needed this bug to be knocked out of me because I was flying to Utah the next day! After he gave me a blessing and left for work, I took my temperature again and was at 101.8 again. I promptly took two Tylenol, dressed in warm clothes and snuggled into bed under 3 blankets. I sweat that fever out good!! You could see my body imprint in the sheets! But the fever never came back. I was still tired, and had a hard time eating that day but I could tell I was on the mend.
I was a little nervous however that I wouldn't make it. Sunday, October 9th, I came down with some kind of bug. I. was. ill. My stomach felt like it was eating itself and I had a fever that got up to 102!
The next morning I was surprisingly awake and was able to hold down a breakfast shake at 5:30 in the morning. My flights were uneventful even though landing in SLC made my stomach feel not so bueno.
Erika picked me up from the airport and that night we were feeling good enough to shop. Shopping is what we do. We're good at it. We find some good bargains. Six dollars for a pair of jeans that say "correct size" and "short" is like hearing the angelic "aaahhhhh" behind you. Love it!
Erika's birthday was the weekend before I came to visit her so I took her to Applebees for a birthday dinner. Turns out that they do Bingo on Wednesday nights so we ate a delicious dinner and played Bingo. It was pretty fun! We also took a day to watch movies and relax. The one day we remembered to get the camera out was when we headed up to BYU campus. Erika said that a lot of buildings and landscaping were new so we decided to head up there and visit. It. was. BEAUTIFUL! It made me want to go back to school again! We went to see the duck pond behind the Benson building and then walked the path that surrounds the Maeser building going towards the RB. It was gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous.
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| The boardwalk is new to the duck pond. And the landscaping is newer and very pretty. |
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| The new KBYU building. It's behind the Bean Museum and next to the Marriott Center |
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| The new "DT" (Deseret Towers) - They're actually more like Heritage halls because they're apartment style living. Up to 200 students can live in each building and there will be 4 buildings at the end of contsruction. |
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| My skills with the blocks. I did this the longest way possible. It took me about 1/2 an hour... |
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| Cami and I's tower. It's "so high!" |
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| Good times Erika. Can't wait to hit up NYC with you! |
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I met up with Jessica, Maria and Debra after my stay with Erika. It was time to get the party started with the Hall girls!
Our family was in charge of the snacks this year so we made some yummy treats. There was candy, mini egg rolls, cheese dip, 7-Layer dip, snicker-doodle popcorn (which by the way, was AWESOME) and we decided that there should be something healthy in there so we threw in a veggie tray :) There were also home-made oreos and marshmallow brownies. Yummy.....
Everyone showed up to the party around dinner time. We had a delicious dinner of haystack chicken. We then went around and gave updates on our families and passed around family pictures. Then we showed what we'd done for Grandma Z projects. I think this is my favorite part because I love to see what people do as projects. Even if they're not physical (like a book or quilt) I love to hear what people made goals to do and how they did them. It gives me inspiration and ideas for me to do. One cousin decided to spend more time with her kids. I loved that! And my sister-in-law ran a 5k. That's amazing! We have wonderful ladies in our Hall family and I'm so grateful to be a part of it. Thank you James for coming from good stock :)
Speaking of projects, I can finally post about mine! I decided, with inspiration from Katie, my sister-in-law, to decorate our room at the cabin to look like Tucson. I painted a little ceramic tile with a cactus, put up other little desert paraphernalia and also a large poster picture that I got from my mother of cacti. Last year, at the Hall Girl party, my cousin-in-law McKenzie had started this amazing quilt. That gave me the idea to do a quilt for our room. I went to the Phoenix quilt show with my mom the following spring (I swear those quilt shows are so fun!) and found the perfect material. My mom helped me with the technique and provided a lot of the tools and help. It took me a while to do it but it finally is done! And the room looks complete now! I love it! So here it is!
Here's more pictures of the fun we had at the party:
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| Aunt Margaret's family was in charge of dinner so instead of pajamas they matched in their aprons! So cute huh! |
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| Sooo adorable!! |
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| Aunt Barbara made the slippers. They're perfect! |
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| They say "H.A.L.L.S" on the back (Halls Annual Ladies Lakeside Siesta) |
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| Aunt Marilyn's family supported "Team Brookie" in honor of her granddaughter who's fighting cancer |
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| Aunt Debbie's "Stars" They were dressed in "One fish, two fish, red fish, blue fish" pants. I loved them. |
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| The deliciousness! |
The colors up at the cabin were so pretty too! The weather was just right, not too cold and not too warm. Just the right amount of "crisp" in the air to make it feel like fall.
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When we got back from the girl party, we had another party for Grandpa Hall. We did heavy heavy hang over and enjoyed some delicious chocolate cake! Afterwards the family went and picked pears (I was asleep for that part - too bushed from all this partying!)
It was such a great time! I'm excited to go back at Christmas! It'll be all snowy then :)
