Just In Time For The Temple... Twice!

About a month ago, I went to San Diego to present at a conference for work. The conference was supposed to end on Wednesday afternoon, but I was able to work it out to come home Tuesday night, since one of my really good friends, Colby Green, was getting married Wednesday morning. My flight was supposed to leave around 5:45, but the plane had mechanical problems (one of the engines was leaking oil). They flew a mechanic in from L.A. to look at it, then they had to fly a part over to fix it, and then the airport closed and wouldn't let us take off. So they sent us all off to a hotel for the night. In my prayers that night, I asked Heavenly Father to help me make it back in time for the temple sealing.

The next morning, I got up at 4am to catch the shuttle back to the airport and I got on the first flight back to Salt Lake. Traffic was really bad for Lacee as she was coming to pick me up, because there had been some pretty bad wrecks on the freeway. We left the airport and Lacee drove up to the Bountiful Temple as I changed into my suit in the car. We arrived just in time for the sealing! I know the Lord helped us make it there, and I was very grateful. It was a miracle!

Then last Saturday, it was Lacee's turn!  She was on a trip in Mexico during her Spring Break building houses. She was coming back on Saturday, and Bridger was going to receive his endowment that evening. They were making good time until they reached Payson. A couch had flown off a trailer and crashed into a motorcycle with two people on it. The freeway was closed as they brought in a helicopter to life-flight them to the hospital. After almost two hours, traffic started moving again. The people Lacee was riding with kind enough to drop her off in Provo on their way back to Lindon. I picked her up and after a hug and kiss, we rushed over to the Provo Temple, again making it just in time. I know the Lord helped us make it on time! It was another miracle!

It was wonderful to be with Bridger during that special time. He'll make a wonderful missionary! During the Priesthood session of General Conference, Elder Rasband spoke about the process the Apostles go through when assigning missionaries to missions, and the whole time I kept thinking about Bridger! We're so excited for you and proud of you!

While we're talking about miracles, I also found out I was admitted to the graduate program I applied for at BYU! It's a dual-degree program focusing on product development, where you get a masters degree in mechanical engineering and an MBA (Masters of Business Administration) at the same time. So it's basically about inventing a product, and then building a business to market and sell it. So we're really excited about that!

Spring Around the Corner

 

Here we go again! We really want to start planting as many things as we can (or have room for), so we went to the store and bought some herb seeds. Last year we grew basil, and that was a hit. We also tried to grow oregano, but it didn't even sprout. Hopefully, we'll have better luck this year!

Other than this latest activity, we've stayed plenty busy with work and school. Travis is going to San Diego next Sunday to Tuesday night for a housing conference in which he's presenting. And I'm getting ready for my trip to Mexico in less than a month. If you guys haven't heard, my friend Danielle and I are spending our spring break in Mexico building houses for LDS members. Travis and I both applied for passports (his expired and this was my first) about a month ago, and we just recently got them in the mail. Yay! My first passport! Danielle and I are organizing a school-supplies drive for the students in our school so we can distribute them among the kids and youth in the town.

This month, we're also looking forward to Pi Day, and our friends' wedding on St. Patrick's Day (Colby and Kat). We also have our Knowledge Bowl Competition the end of March- our team should do very well.

Merry Christmas!

We had a great time with both families this Christmas. It was the Anderson's turn to visit this year, so that's where we spent most of our time, but next year we'll be back at the Talbot's.

We spent a couple of days at a cabin, and we had lots of fun catching up with all of Travis's siblings (all but one live out of state), and sledding. It was so much fun, especially to see those nieces and nephews who have never sledded before! They're either from Texas or Arizona; it was so fun to see them playing in the snow!

I'm afraid the picture above is the only one we currently have from the week. We temporarily lost our camera, and still have to download pictures that other people took of us. It's not the best photo, but it'll do. :)

Other than that, we're just enjoying the week without school! Travis will be starting winter semester soon, and then register for one more class after that. He'll be graduating with his Bachelors in August, we're so excited! He's also going to be applying for grad school in the next couple of weeks here, so wish him luck!

If you haven't already, check out our blog. Travis posted a project he did for one of his classes- I think you guys will like it! http://travisandlacee.blogspot.com/

p.s. okay, so since I'm the one who introduced you guys to "Wicked", may I make another suggestion of a soundtrack to get? "Aida". It's another broadway show. The story and especially the music is sooooo beautiful! You guys would really like it! We saw the play at the Hale Center Theater this year, and we were dumbfounded! Travis got me the soundtrack for Christmas, and I've been listening to it almost non-stop since then! Two thumbs up!

Happy Halloween!

On Friday, Travis and I were able to go to our ward Halloween party- it was a lot of fun! We didn't know what to dress up as, but earlier that day I saw the art teacher (at my school) had dressed up as Peter Pan. It didn't seem too hard to put together, so we decided to do that. At Savers, I found a couple green shirts I was able to cut up, and I got a green bed sheet I could make a skirt out of. It actually didn't look too bad!

We then went to Rob and Kim's house and made/decorated sugar cookies, and watched "The Village". It was kind of scary, but it was some comfort to already know the ending, and you're right Brigham, the ending is just dumb.

Yesterday, we spent time with both the Andersons and Talbots, which was a lot of fun. Thanks mom and dad for the homemade root beer and yummy rolls!

On a different note, Rob showed Travis and I this really funny clip...well, maybe it's just funny to engineers. But we think it's a good way of showing Travis's kind of humor...he was almost on the floor, he and Rob were laughing so hard!

http://www.funnyplace.org/stream.php?id=13174

Wonderful Birthday!

So, when I got to school yesterday, I opened up my laptop and noticed a small envelope taped to it. I opened it up and found a 3x5 card with a poem from Travis. It was the beginning of a scavenger hunt which led to about 7 other poems, each one giving me a clue to where we were going to eat that night. He hid them in the freezer, under the mail box, in drawers, closets, in the car, everywhere! It was so much fun, and each poem was so creative and so cute! He gave me 3 storage buckets (to store rice, flour, and sugar), and a really nice camo-pack! We had some car problems, but Rob insisted that we borrow their car and go out to eat. We ate at one of my FAVORITE places, Barbacoa (it's kind of like Cafe Rio, but not as noisy!). Anyway, it was so cute, I feel like the luckiest girl in the world!

Also, we created a blog for our family. We'll still contribute to this blog, but we'll also have other things on ours. Here's the address: travisandlacee.blogspot.com
Feel free to check it out!

Happy Anniversary!

Wow, can you believe it's been one year since Travis and I have been married? We can't believe it either, it goes by so fast! We were able to go down to St. George for the weekend and have some fun down there in the sun. We stopped by Panguitch on the way down and were able to see the parade! We grabbed some treats and cool toys from it. In St. George we swam in the hotel pool, got sunburned, visited the outlet stores (only spent 3.00!), went to the Tuacahn Theater and saw Footloose, went through the St. George temple, and our personal favorite, watch several episodes of Duck Tales.

All in all, it was a really fun vacation. I'm only sad I had to leave the very next day to come back up to Clear Creek. :(

I miss you, husband!

-Lacee

Clear Creek

As most of you know, I went up to Clear Creek this past week to train to be a teacher. This next week I'm headed back up there to actually teach. I'll be teaching things about trees, the history of the surrounding towns and ghost towns, natural minerals, and etc. It sounds boring, but we kept it really basic- perfect for my level. It should be a lot of fun. I got to see a lot of cool things, like dead chipmunks and squirrels' heads caught through trap doors. (The kids were able to make their own traps- most of them survived and were set free, a couple weren't so lucky...) The best part of all, though, was coming home and seeing my family, especially the love of my life, Travis. It was hard not being able to call him all week! Talk about torture!

Florida

Here we are at Magic Kingdom in Orlando!

Orlando

As you know, we are currently in Orlando and are having the time of our lives! Well, I guess I can say that more than my poor husband. He's been having to go to really boring meetings all day while I party at Disney's Animal Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios. He did meet up with me, though, yesterday afternoon after his meeting. We were able to go on a few things before the park closed (some parks close really early). But we're having a really fun time.

On Sunday, we attended a ward 20 minutes away- not as far as I thought one would be! Then we were able to walk around the Orlando Temple grounds. It is a beautiful temple! I didn't realize how big it was going to be either, it's not one of those small temples. You could see it so easily sticking up from the flat, green terrain. It's kind of like the D.C. temple, how it sticks up out of this hill of trees and you can see it so clearly from so far away. I loved walking around the temple, holding my husband's hand. He picked a nearby lilly off a stem and put it in my hair. He's too cute!
On the walls surrounding the perimeter of the temple were these cute little lizards that would scatter away if you got too close. It was really cute. I thought of bringing one home to mom, but, of course, didn't. Travis said, "Yeah, your mom would probaby name it 'Princess', or something..."
We took some pictures there- but I'll have to post them when I get back next week.

My Amazing Husband

I just wanted to give a shout out to my amazing husband, Travis. I've been sick all week and he's taken such good care of me. He makes me feel like a princess even when I'm feeling lousy. What a guy!

Hello, all!

Lacee and Travis here. We apologize for not contributing to this blog sooner, but nothing really big is going on, so we don't have much to say. Travis is still going to school and working, and so am I. I just happen to work at a school. The students are getting ready to take a big vocabulary test on Thursday/Friday, so today was a review day for my A day students.

A popular game I play is with a bow and arrow, just two of those $1 ones at Maceys, with the suction cups at the end. I write all the vocabulary words on the white board, and have one player from each team come up, stand behind a line, and once I say one of their vocab words in English, they'll try to look for, and hit the Spanish vocab word (they each have their own bow and arrow). The first person to hit the correct word (in a reasonable proximity) wins the round. If the arrow sticks to the board, they get 2 points. If it hits (close enough) and bounces off, then it's just 1 pt. Anyway, not that you wanted to know all that, but that's just something the kids really enjoy. It was actually Travis's idea for using a bow and arrow, before that I was just going to use fly swatters.

Travis has currently been researching the GMAT, and taking online practice tests. He's kind of worried as to how he'll do (he plans to take it sometime within this year), but I know he'll do just fine. He wants to apply for a joint program after he graduates, which focuses on Mechanical Engineering and Business, so he can also get an MBA. He's been working so hard- I'm so proud of him!

Mushu's good. He's on a diet and is currently outside in the dark. He's looking forward to our Florida vacation in a few weeks when he can stay with the Talbots and follow Vixie everywhere. Just like old times.

I was planning to end by quoting from a Maceys song, but I actually can't think of one. That's a wonderful thing. :)

Where's my husband?

Hello all! So, how about adding Travis to the blog? He's part of the family now. Can we change it to include his name at the top of the blog, along with ours?