Happy Thanksgiving! I hope yours was great. Ours definitely was. Aunt Kerry invited Sarah and I over to have dinner with her and Jesse and Gracie. We were going to go at around lunch time, but they asked us to come later, which was super great because Sarah and I spent the morning and afternoon hours of the day putting together (like a puzzle) a four poster queen-size bed. It was not an easy task to say the least. And (we laugh about it now) but things kinda got kinda heated between us at times, as I was skeptical that we could even do it, and Sarah had asked me more than once if I was really willing to do all the work. And believe me, it was work. But, in the end, I am glad we spent the time doing so, as it is a great addition to our bedroom. I don't remember if I told you, but Sarah and I got this bed from a member in another ward, which our branch president was working for. Funnily, their names were John and Stephanie, haha. They were getting rid of furniture, and we were given those items. In exchange, we helped them move some of their furniture into their house. We have had the parts lying around our bedroom, but it was nice getting them into a nice furniture piece. It wasn't easy, but I guess it was worth it. All that we needed was a socket wrench. Uncle Jesse let us borrow his. Actually he gave us his whole tool box, which was extremely nice of him. We used the wrench to tighten the bolts. It is a nice looking bed. Sarah said it best, we need to find something to assemble every holiday to come closer together.
Thanksgiving was pretty grand. We had dinner with the Williams family. It was super good. My favorite parts of the meal were two things that Gracie made, the mashed potatoes and the bacon-wrapped asparagus. We also ate some ham, a salad, fruit salad and other stuff. The conversation was stimulating, and it was just awesome to be able to share in a meal with family. They were great. We learned why Gracie had a boot on her foot (she was being competitive with a couple of boys at camp). We were so grateful to have a place to go this holiday.
Alright, I know you're dying to hear about the BYU vs Utah game. Well, all in all, BYU surprised all of us, including Kyle Whittingham, the first two quarters. Utah is ranked, and we held them to 0 points by the beginning of half time. They played an extraordinary first two quarters, it was actually pretty crazy. Zach Wilson was doing soooooooooooooo good. 3rd quarter even looked good, but as you know, the game doesn't end in the 3rd quarter. Utah's defense lit a spark for them at the end of the 3rd, and well, the flame got brighter for them, enough to even add an exclamation point and ultimately, beating BYU by 8 points. It was probably one of BYU's highest scoring games. But in the end, that didn't really matter. The cool thing about watching the game with Sarah, is that she had the idea of putting the computer up on the bars of our bed, and we watched it horizontally, as seen in the picture. In other news, I was at work at Amazon when another rivalry game was being played, ASU vs Arizona. ASU came back to win from under by one point. It was spread throughout the workplace right after they beat them.
Yeah, I worked a lot this weekend. So much, that it really didn't feel like a holiday (except for Thursday). I worked at the school Monday-Wednesday, and 11 hours both Friday and Saturday at Amazon. Nothing too crazy happened this week there. However, I tend to wear my BYU hat to work and a coworker noticed and he was like "BYU fan, eh?" and I was like yeah.
Sarah hasn't been feeling well the last couple of days. She did make it to church, though. Last week she was called as Primary Chorister. Well, they didn't have a pianist, so I volunteered my talents. It was pretty cool to sit in on primary. A nice change. Especially junior primary. Those little kids will melt your heart, as they did mine. I couldn't believe their testimonies of the gospel and willingness to participate, even if their participation was a little off topic. No one contacted Sarah about the basics of the calling, so she began by with songs about Christmas. Well, after junior primary, Gloria Cruz told us how things were suppose to go. She pointed us to the manual and showed us which songs we were to sing. So Sarah changed it up for varsity primary. There were definitely a whole lot more in senior primary than in Junior. And with more children came much more rowdiness. The sister in charge of Sharing Time, Sister English, shared a super nice lesson about the 10 Lepers. It was truly compelling, even after having read the story in the scriptures before. She had taped up 10 pictures of lepers around the primary room, and had them play a game where they find them and then answer a couple questions about the lesson.
I brought my computer to early meetings this morning, and I'm glad I did, as it was the thing keeping me awake, really. We had Priesthood Executive Committee with the high councilman Brother Peterson. I definitely learned a lot early this morning. Then we had Branch Council. It was pretty good. Sarah was the pianist for Branch Choir this afternoon after church. The sister leading the choir has never led music before and is really hard to follow, as well as being strong-minded. She can be easy to disagree with. I kinda wish I was leading choir now. I was helping Brother Mora do tithing, as well as printing checks for families in need for the President of the Rama.
We called mom for her birthday. I hope it was great. I know that she probably had a blast with the other kids being there, and especially Cohen.
On Tuesday, the teacher and aides of our class, the SID class, had a Thanksgiving feast that Sarah and I participated in. We were asked to bring rolls. So on Monday for FHE, Sarah and I made rolls from scratch. We had a good time making them, including making family videos whilst doing them, along with pictures. It was quite the experience. I don't know, sometimes I wonder if I have the patience to do long work, as the prospect of spending at least three hours making rolls, and a whole day making the bed really concerned me. But in the end, everything worked out just fine.
What do you think? Is it time to send up the flares for Christmas? I think so. Today I started listening to Christmas songs on Spotify. Actually, I was looking at all the playlists that Spotify has for Christmas the other day, in preparation. They have a lot. I chose my favorites, and ignored all the strange, vulgar ones. Do you remember Dan Fogelberg? I will always remember his "I Saw Three Ships come Sailing In," version of the song. Or Pat a Pan by Manheim Steamroller. Or A Charlie Brown Christmas Christmas music. There is just so many good things to listen to at Christmastime. I'm grateful for Christmas music.
I hope you are doing great. You are amazing. Keep up the good work, and congratulations on Rose's baptism. We love hearing from you!
Love,
John
Oh, I almost forgot, Sarah and I started a craft for the Christmas Holiday. Sarah picked up the stuff on Friday and actually ran into a Mesa High coworker, who let her and me go to her house to do the craft. It was fun and she actually fed us. The lady, Aundrea, helped Sarah get gas after her car wouldn't start, so fortunately she ran into her there.
