while hubby is away wife will play

I'm happy to say that its Friday now, and only two days until Sam will be home. I have definitely survived this week thanks to lots of shopping and girl time. Tuesday I went shopping with my cousin's wives, Mary and Abbie. Its been a long time since I've shopped til I've dropped. Tuesday we did just that. We started with the brand new Marshalls (it was a bust). By the time we had searched that store up and down we were starving and went to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner. Mary and I shared the Crispy Chicken Costoletta, delicious! Tuesday was the first time in all of my Cheesecake Factory history that I did not order dessert. I've noticed that my love of sweets has been drastically declined since being married, this just proves it. We spent the rest of our evening mostly at H&M. They had fantastic sales going on and I purchased only items on clearance. Our last stop was a quick run into Nordstrom Rack, after years of shopping sales at TJMaxx its hard to spend more than $20 on... anything, so nothing there for me. I literally passed out when we got home at 9:30pm. We'd been out together since 3:30pm, a true girls day. Many thanks to my cousins Ryan and Jason for sharing their wives with me all evening :)




I've posted pictures about this on facebook, but when we were heading up to go shopping we passed the Alpine fires burning. I've never seen anything like that in my life. I've been blessed to have never encountered natural disaster or destruction where I have lived, but this was very close to home. I took pictures with Mary's Iphone to send Sam, the smoke was so thick it looked to me like the pictures you see after the atomic bomb was dropped in Japan. Here is a picture my sister in law Christi took from their backyard to give you an idea of what I mean. Just crazy. Below is a picture of the fires at night. A friend (Aimee Stephens) took this picture and I took it from her FB page. That is an LDS temple in the front of the burning fires. Its the Mount Timpangogas temple, which is near Sam's parents and his two sister's homes. I find the picture beautiful, yet frightening.

Many of my feelings about the fires from Tuesday carried over to the fourth of July. It felt a little inappropriate to be watching fireworks (in Pleasant Grove) while if you looked to your left, you could see the glow of the fires still burning on the mountains. However, prayers were answered yesterday and after almost 2 months without rain (http://m.news.hjnews.com/news/article_4d55548e-ba78-11e1-b879-001a4bcf887a.html?mode=jqm) the heavens were opened and rained poured. I truly believe it was an act from God to answer all of his children's prayers. Sam told me, from a well connected source that every missionary in the MTC fasted and prayed for rain. I have no doubt that it is true. (The MTC stands for Missionary Training Center, which is where LDS missionaries go prior to leaving for the areas they will serve. For more on what fasting is, http://www.lds.org/study/topics/fasting-and-fast-offerings?lang=eng).

Other than that, I enjoyed the 4th of July very much. I worked a very busy lunch shift, but then headed to Sam's parents for a BBQ with his sister's families. And then went to see the fireworks.

Yesterday I had a great morning with my girlfriend Allie. We are in the same Ward (congregation) and are pretty close neighbors. We grabbed lunch at Noodles and Co and finished our day date with a matinee viewing of the new Pixar movie Brave. It was a lot of fun! Like I said, I think I'd be going stir crazy if it wasn't for so many fun plans. While I'm home I watch a lot of reruns of the Wonder Years. I'm absolutely in love with that show right now :) as well as clean the house (or just keep it clean at least) and finishing up some projects around the house! Only two more days, then Sam will be home and will have the entire week off :)