Graduated at Last! Part I

We were so SO lucky to have Grandpa Banks, Uncle Alan, Allison and Capri, and Amy and kids come for our graduation! It made the celebration that much more special. Thursday morning, we drove into Alpine to see everyone and to celebrate with a festive lunch. Blue streamers and blue balloons were everywhere! GO BYU! A family of True Blue fans!

Uncle Alan, Nancy, Amy, Clara, George, Mya, April, Alex, Capri, and Allison

(sorry, very hard to see)

Grandpa Banks, Emily, Jason, Karl, Harlan

The Gruber girls are so cute...blue cups, plates, napkins, etc...

Who knew reading could be so much fun?!?

 Mya is finally coming around to us!

Emily, April, Mya, Jason, and Alex

After a fun morning/afternoon, we rushed back to Provo to get ready for the Commencement Ceremony. Typically students just sit with their graduating Schools; but being married, Jason and I got to choose which School we wanted to sit with (Family, Home, and Social Sciences for me, or Marriott School of Management for Jason). The choice was not hard at all (especially since it had been several months since I had even been in school...I officially graduated in December 2009, but graduation ceremonies are not held in the Winter).

Lining up for Commencement Exercises

Inside the Marriott Center... great seats!

The guest speaker for this years Commencement Exercises was Elder D. Todd Christofferson. 

He gave such a great talk and it was enjoyed by all!

 The ceremony was followed by a lot of pictures...be prepared!

The night ended with another Gruber celebration of food, cake, presents, and dancing...yes, dancing:

Again, we capitalize on any opportunity we can to show off our ballroom skills...or so it seems!

Following acts included dancing by Karl, Nancy, Amy, and Allison. I reckon George stayed out of it and continued to observe from his chair.

The Arbons Love Getting Married

So, I just had to pay a quick tribute to my uncle's family for having the most weddings within a four month period! My cousin, Brooke, got married the end of January... her younger brother, Brock, got married the very end of April...and another younger brother, Thayne, got married a week later. Wow! That's a lot of weddings, receptions, and wedding dinners/luncheons..and would have been a lot of showers if I was able to attend all of them. Another cousin from the Arbon side (Paul) also has a wedding date set for the end of September! 2010 is the year for Arbon weddings apparently!

Brooke and Andrew taking pictures on a painfully windy day!

Jason and I showing off our Ballroom routine at Brooke's reception

 

Brock and Liliana at the Salt Lake Temple

Brock's reception at the Zions Bank Building in Salt Lake

(while I tastefully demonstrate my eye crossing abilities)

Thayne and Veronica

Sadly, I don't have any "in-the-action" photos yet of Thayne's wedding...

those will have to be inserted later

And coming in September...Paul and Mandy's wedding:

(the two love birds dancing at Brooke's reception)

...if you're confused, it's ok...so am I...

Reading Days are for Suckers...

Hence, Jason spent his first Reading Day at Snowbird with Richard Tadje. Nothing like skiing on a week day when you would normally be in school.

Hooray for no more Reading Days...EVER!

Another activity we enjoyed towards the end of the semester was our Divine Comedy date. You could say Jason and I have become Divine Comedy "regulars" as well as most of the Gruber family. It may sound dorky, but we are proud to say we LOVE Divine Comedy and we can't wait for the next show in the fall. If anyone wants to join us, let us know...we love to share! It is hilarious!!! Natalie, Austin, Mike, and Kaitlyn joined us last time and we had a ball! We even ended the night with some fancy cupcakes from The Cocoa Bean Cupcake Cafe. YUM!

To come...Graduation!

Slowly getting around to April

So obviously the first weekend in April was pretty big, with it being Easter and General Conference and all. That Friday night, Jason and I got a chance to "play house" I guess you could say. Max and April needed some babysitters for the evening so they could go celebrate April's birthday, and Jason and I were the ones for the job. We were let off SO easy though, since the kids had already been fed and Mya was already down to sleep. Alex, of course, is no sweat since he is extremely smart and usually very obedient. He patiently waited while Jason and I ate our dinner, showed us a few toys, and then asked for a bed time story (but not one read from a book: Alex's rule for the night). The rest of the evening was spent relaxing on the couch. Geez, parenting is a piece of cake ;)

Saturday afternoon we went up to Alpine to join the Grubers in watching Conference. During Priesthood Session, Nancy and I went to Deseret Book...where, apparently, all sisters of Zion meet up to enjoy refreshments and free giveaways. I was completely shocked to see how many women attend the event; it was definitely a fun atmosphere and the brownies were great! Nancy and I walked away with a cute stationary set, and Nancy actually won one of the drawings and got a nice Easter book. Hooray for Priesthood Session!

Jason and I stayed the night in Alpine and woke up to a deliciously sweet breakfast (thanks to Karl)! The rest of the day was spent enjoying a wonderful and uplifting Conference and celebrating April's birthday.

 

Oh how I love the holidays!

Finishing March in a Nutshell

So I had my first rock climbing experience. To say the least, I anticipated doing a lot better! We went with Mike and Kaitlyn Pacada, and (the now) Jon and Leigh Low. Jon and Leigh had membership passes to The Quarry in Provo and so we were able to get discounts to go with them. Jason, Mike, Jon....everyone for that matter...did awesome. I did one climb...and that was about all my fingers could handle at that point (I didn't even make it all the way to the top...ah so shameful). I definitely am looking forward to returning to the rock wall with a vengeance! At least we were able to get Spoon It Up afterward :)

Mike

Jon in the maroon

                        

Sadly no pictures of the girls...  

Another fun day (ironically also spent with Mike and Kate) was celebrating the famous Hari Krishna "Festival of Colors!" I'm not sure it is really worth all of the hype, but it definitely had an exciting element to it. Neither Jason nor I had been before, so we were really looking forward to it this time. We were among the mass of people who were dumb enough to take the school bus to and from the Hindu Temple. That's a fine route to take if you enjoy being stuffed into a crowded school bus and sitting for an hour in traffic...while people are passing you on the street by foot. Upon our eventual arrival, it was just our luck that they decided to start the chalk throwing ten minutes early. They were counting down just as we were walking around the corner...so we missed it!!! But, to our defense, it was quite a sight to see it from the outside (rather than being blinded and choked amongst the chalk dust).  

No, that is not a huge nose bleed...some idiot threw chalk right into my face!

Jaleah and I found each other! Strictly by luck!

A final March memory of note was night skiing with my cousins Paul, Mark, Danny, and Jason at Sundance. The snow was literally ice and there were a million people there...not the best of conditions...but it was still a blast and well worth the price!

Paul, me, Jason, Mark, and Danny

The Fire

It was a quiet Saturday night on March 6th of 2010. Jason and Emily were enjoying a nice evening at home just relaxing in front of the TV. A witty marathon of The Office and a delicious batch of fresh chocolate-chip cookies were all they needed for a good excuse to spend the weekend night at home. The only slight disruption was the sound of faint sirens outside...faint sirens progressed into a crescendo of sirens...until suddenly the sirens were so loud that they could only assume they were right in their backyard!

Curiosity got the best of Emily as she pulled apart the blinds and peeked our her window. Confirming her suspicions, she saw the lights of blue and red bouncing brightly off of the windows and cars close by. "What could this be about?" she asked herself. She quickly opened the door, not wanting to miss any of the action. To her utter shock, the moment she opened the door, giant flames were erupting from the underground parking garage just below her, threatening to expand and lick up the stairs leading to her apartment. The sound of crackling fire and small explosions filled her ears.

"The fire is here!" is all that managed to escape her lips. Jason lept up to his feet and ran to the door. They both stood there not knowing what to do. Seconds later, a young female voice could be heard running frantically along the apartment walkway below: "There's a fire! Get out!" she screamed as she pounded on each door to wake any sleeping tenants. By the time she ran up the stairs to Jason and Emily's floor, they could hear a hint of hysteria in her voice and she tried not to sob as she exclaimed warnings to their neighbors.

After a quick glance around the room, not knowing of anything to grab besides her phone, Emily immediately left the apartment and quickly ran down the stairs, the heat of the flames blaring against her body. She ran to the side of the apartment building where a group of tenants had gathered. After a couple anxious minutes, Jason finally made his way down, as he too attempted to search the apartment of anything worthy of grabbing. (Sadly to say, he came down empty-handed...illustrating the "quality possessions" that they own).

More minutes passed by and they wondered why the fire fighters were not working to put out the fire; the fire engines were already in place. However, not too much later, the fire fighters emerged and proceeded to pound on each door to ensure everyone was evacuated from the apartment. To Emily's horror, after the fire fighters examined their room, they left their apartment door open and continued down the stairs. After bringing it to the attention of an officer near by, he said it was too late and nothing could be down to shut the door.

The fire was quickly extinguished, but the smoke grew in great black and grey clouds, filtering its way directly into the open door of their apartment. The stairway consisted of a canopy that followed the stairs up to the top floor, where Jason and Emily's apartment door was the first one you come to. Naturally, the stairway canopy acted as a perfect funnel for the smoke to follow up into their room. Emily was not too happy about that, especially once the realization of any possible danger was gone.

To make a long story short, they were finally allowed back into their smoke-scented apartment (and they quickly turned off the stove that was prepared for cookie baking). Luckily, the smokey smell did not last for more than a day or two. Speculation has it that the fire was started by some hooligans who found it entertaining to light paper on fire inside of the gas intake hole. The car they chose was parked underground, right next to a huge pile of old furniture that had been discarded through the years by the tenants. The furniture only helped to feed the fire even more.

The entire true story has yet to be heard by Jason and Emily. Unfortunately, as described before, they did not think to grab their camera in the blaze of action. However, they were able to take a few shots of the aftermath:

View from the bedroom window (through the screen)

The remains of what used to be a huge pile of furniture...

Guilty Pleasures

So...growing up, I used to play a game called Age of Empires with my family. Yes, it is "one of those computer games." I'm no gamer....unless it comes to that game. My brother and I used to call it Book of Mormon Wars, just so my mom would let us play it on Sundays or for Family Night!



Anyways, the last Friday night in February, Tyson, my dad, the Phillips boys (my cousins), and I got together for a reminiscent game night! There were about eight of us playing at one time. And we played late into the night. I hadn't played for about...8 years? give or take? So I got slaughtered, to say the least. But it did start a fire, much to Jason's dismay...I've been guilty of "practicing" over the last couple months.

The next day was also a stroll down memory lane...I went with Amy, Camry, and Kimberly to Nordic Valley for another day of skiing. My family used to make frequent visits to Wolf Creek (a resort in Eden) where we had a timeshare with World Mark. Growing up, Amy came with my family several times to stay with us. Near the resort, there is a TINY ski resort and tubing run. We went there a couple times to ski and to ride on the tubes (one time meaning a dislocated shoulder for my dad). Amy and I had completely forgotten about the resort, until recently, when we were searching for a cheap place to ski. After some confusion on my part (Wolf Creek and Midway are the same thing, right?) we finally made it there that Saturday. It may be a small resort, but it's the perfect place for beginning skiers like us...

...and beautiful view of the valley!

You can tell by these pictures that we have some serious skills...ha!

Camry, myself, and Kimberly