Family Christmas Letter

Oh hey it's been a while, but here's some fun I didn't actually write! My dad writes our family Christmas letter every year in his witty way. Here it is for your reading pleasure:

Holiday Tidings from the Thomas family, 2013

Really the whole year is a blur. If we could just print this letter blurrily, I could get away with almost any version of the 2013 story. But Maria is so vigilant about Christmas letters, and the children so picky about the record of their lives, that only my section will benefit from some creative thinking. 

So let’s do the fiction first. I published a lot of important and path-breaking scholarship, reclaimed the golf game of my youth, transformed the minds and lives of all my students, and toned my body into top-notch performance and strength. I brightened every day for my angel bride, inspired my children to legendary excellence and compassion, and cursed no cats. Also I stopped yelling at fallible athletes, exuded grace and charm in all social settings, and generally just made the world a beautiful place. On a lighter note, my doctor spent an hour cutting in my back, while we chatted about healthcare economics and other fun stuff.

Maria wishes she could live up to that standard, but seriously! She did take Santa Lucia to the next level, incorporating some Swedish lore into the ward Christmas celebration that she orchestrated with much assistance from neighborhood children and grown-ups. (I helped with ideas.) She tried to resign from the local education foundation, but they begged her to stay—so nice to be indispensable! I think she now does all the Christmas shopping, for herself as well as everyone else. You can often find her planning her Relief Society lesson a month ahead, and she did a bunch of other stuff, but modesty prevents her telling all. I’d like to add two magic words, however: Suprep and sedation. Enough said?

Hannah, a feminist of sorts, has just about proposed marriage to her man Riley—and they have a wedding date in the Salt Lake Temple next April. We wish them well. She had a short but intense study abroad in the British Isles, with a side trip to Rome and Florence. We remember the day she got lost in the Lake District and had a standoff with a sheep. At the request of management, she moved from a supervisory role in the Cougareat to a similar but mellower role at the Museum of Art Café. To me this seems like a great move, since she actually studies Art and such, but she finds it kind of boring after the frenzy she mastered. She has enjoyed her roommates (a first) in a nice location near campus; she still LOVES to write papers.

He’s not that happy about it, but Jordan’s year resembled the previous one. Here’s a cut and paste from 2012 with minimal editing: He “strove for marital bliss, driving back and forth across the [Colorado] border to woo a maiden. Sadly, his efforts ultimately went unrewarded, and now he is a bitter old[er] economist, or at least a heartsick student. Luckily he’ll be retaking a few classes next year so he can get more practice with his major. Meanwhile he continues to work at Porter’s Craft and Frame, which would seem like a good place to meet potential domestic goddesses. Time should heal his wounds, if a steady diet of Taco Bell, [muffins], and Mountain Dew doesn’t kill him first. The cats appreciate the time he spends in bed.” [I changed three things.] His latest aspiration is to own a toy store. He says video games are just as real as sports.

Brooke has a knack for winning hot tickets—she got two to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir concert with James Taylor in September, as well as their Christmas concert this month. After a winter job search, she was hired at Marketecture in Utah Valley to write content for business web pages, helping retailers sell everything from camping equipment to pet supplies to home brewing kits. She commutes in her “new” Hyundai, loves the pebble ice, navigates the corporate culture, and debates proper usage of exclamation points in commercial prose, a practical expression of her college training. At church she serves in the Relief Society of a young single adult congregation; Prince Charming has not yet whisked her away from modern life.

We traveled to Utah for a Thomas reunion to mark the parents’ golden wedding anniversary and to Oregon to visit some of the Morgans. Later we went to the Cardston Alberta temple on the 90^th anniversary of its dedication and to Palmyra, NY on the 190^th anniversary of the angel Moroni’s first appearance. We returned from both places with fond memories (and British chocolate from Canada). We close by echoing the ancient angels’ message: glory to God on high and peace to all on earth.

Pumpkin Love

It will come as no surprise to those who know me well or have read this post from last year that I love pumpkins. I wasn't sure how much pumpkin love I was going to get this year. I figured I could carve a pumpkin on my own, but it's more fun with others too. So when my roommate asked me to help her carve one for her work pumpkin carving contest, I was happy to oblige.  We looked at various ideas online. One of our favorites was Ryan Gosling saying "Hey girl," but we ended up with a small pumpkin and that would have been really difficult to pull off, so we went with Tinker Bell instead and I think she turned out really cute! And isn't the pixie dust fun? 

You can see the flashlight we used to illuminate it in the picture, but don't let that distract you from the charm.

In addition to carving pumpkins, I love pumpkin baked goods. My two favorite recipes are this cake here and these cookies. I just tried the cookie recipe tonight and yeah, they're awesome, with or without the salt on top, btw. So thought I'd share so you can give it a try too! Yum!

Being Daphne

Last night I went to a Halloween dance with my friends. For the past few years, they've dressed up as a group for Halloween—they'll tell you all about the glory days of Ghostbusters, and last year they did Mario. This year was a little more low-key, going with Scooby Doo. Since there's a scarcity of women in my old ward, when I mentioned that I was thinking of crashing their stake dance, they asked me to join them. I had the clothes for either Velma or Daphne, but since my hair is long and red, I was glad they chose Daphne.

Just before the dance, I was going to go see if I could find a more purple ribbon or hairband, since the one I have is super light and pinkish. I started driving and realized both my headlights were burned out...turned around and drove back. I knew the one was, and had purchased a new bulb, but hadn't put it in yet, so I was stuck. I ditched the ribbon idea, called my friend but he didn't answer, so I started walking to the church, since it's just a couple blocks away. I had a flashlight so cars could see me. I had texted the other friend and so when I was about halfway, he called and they came and picked me up. During this whole ordeal the irony that Daphne was always the damsel in distress did not escape me. I just really got into character!

Fred, Zombie, Daphne, Scooby, Shaggy with Scooby Snacks

So with the help of Scooby and Shaggy I got to the dance. It was a lot of fun. Had I not been there, these poor boys would have been stuck dancing without a girl for a good chunk of the night, since merging with other groups didn't always work out. So it worked out pretty well for me. And it felt great to dance!

Flooding and Zombies

The waters rushed in, quickly flooding the area. We moved to higher ground, barely keeping above the water as it quickly rose. Then the zombies came.

That's kinda how I feel about work right now. There's a flood of work, I'm sort of keeping up...a ton of content to write, but so far people are still getting their sites done in time...barely. But now we have more people on the products team...and not yet on content. That was the zombies...they appeared this morning. We're still doing okay, but I'm sure looking forward to getting someone else in here!

On a happier note (sort of), we read a bunch of really crummy writing sometimes. While it can be a little painful, it also is hilarious sometimes. Here's a taste.

Bad blog title: Do You Have the Jowls of a Bulldog?
What we wanted to write: You ARE a bulldog, so stop feeling self-conscious, little buddy.

Bad blog title: In the Following Paragraphs We're Going to Be Taking a Look at the Dark Side of Fat Loss Programs
(Yes, there are a ton of really lousy LONG titles...)
Following comments: Give into your cravings. Join the fat side.
Give into your hate for healthy food.
I find your lack of exercise disturbing.

And the worst, excerpts from an article online:
Do you like apple accent colors and Native American appearance products? Are you because decorating your home with some of these items?
This is a actual baby and simple account that can accomplish a big aberration in a room.
Learning about this appearance of adornment is aloof as agitative as adornment your home with some of these accomplished pieces.

Yeah...so that one I found what appears to be the original article and they just substituted a bunch of words that made no sense...most of them starting with the letter A.

One more from today...don't have the exact quote, but it was something like, "When buying a silver bracelet, you want to be sure it doesn't fit too loosely, because that could cause embarrassment."

So there's a glimpse of the funny nonsense we see while writing.

Introvert or Extrovert? The World May Never Know

So I recently encountered this funny little MBTI Harry Potter chart: http://m.imgur.com/gallery/iRCaD4u
I looked at it and thought, I'm pretty sure I'm an ISFJ, which put me as Neville Longbottom. I read the description and it fit fairly well. But I left the chart open so I could look at my old test results from my freshman year of college.



To my surprise, my old results were ESFJ! Say what?! I came out on the extroverted side?! I read the description and it fit fairly well too.



I do identify with a lot of introverted tendencies, but sometimes I'm more extroverted. I really like to be around people and I don't really like to be alone to think. I do need my own time, but not to think...to not think, more like...anyway...I took another online MBTI test and came out ISFJ, so I think I'm an extroverted introvert. Maybe an introverted extrovert? I'm thinking the former. Mostly just crazy? Yeah.

Nacho Night

Last weekend I had a bunch of friends over for Nacho Night. Now, Nacho Night is a concept that has been tossed around for several years. I first discussed it shortly after my mission with my best friend growing up and our freshman friend group. The concept is to watch Nacho Libre and eat nachos. We talked about doing it because I'd never seen Nacho Libre and my friends quoted it all the time. "It's the best!"

Well, it never happened. And my friends moved away. Except one, he's still here, and just got married, leaving me the last single one of our group, the stinker. Anyway, time passed and I still hadn't seen Nacho Libre. I guess I should mention that the reason I hadn't seen it before these friends talked about it was because my family didn't like it, so I didn't bother. But after hearing good reviews from other people I trusted, I had the desire rekindled.

Then last summer when I became part of The Box, I finally saw Nacho Libre. And it was hilarious. It left a lasting impression, so much so that when I found it on sale for $5 I bought it. And then I thought, "Nacho Night should still happen...different friends, but still a good idea."

So I made it happen. I set a date, I invited my friends, I prepared the food. It was a Box reunion. Several of former Box-ers were married this summer and Chris was gone all summer so it was nice to get everyone together again, plus a few others. We had delish nachos (and yummy cake), visited and caught up, and watched the movie. There was much laughter throughout the night. It was a lot of fun. The era of the Box has ended, so moments like those are the best. The only problem is that I always forget to take pictures...so hopefully next time we all get together we'll think to take some pics to record the awesomeness!

Oh, and this is what the man himself thought of our night:

The Tempest Was Raging

We had some crazy weather yesterday. While a lot of people noticed because the BYU Football game was delayed and a lot of people got soaked, there was a lot of flooding and crazy stuff going on besides that. We watched the rain come down from our large windows, and we could hardly see anything. The wind was blowing so hard that there was a waterfall on the windows themselves. I went to a side window and could hardly see our neighbor's yard, it was raining so hard. I heard Leah calling me and went back to our main room, where there was a puddle of water inside the door. I got a towel to soak it up, but the carpet did get a little damp against that wall. Apparently we were lucky though, because a lot of houses in this area suffered pretty bad flooding. 

Once the rain slowed, I headed out to Lehi, but I found this tree that had been uprooted on the side of the house. I had to twist off a branch that blocked the path. I also had two large branches to clear out of the driveway before I could leave. Another roommate came home just then, and warned me of a huge puddle just up the street. 

I think it didn't fall the whole way because it hit the other trees.

I drove a different way to avoid that puddle, but Center St in Orem was pretty flooded. The intersections were the worst, but I also avoided the right lane because it was completely submerged in water. Yeah, it was crazy. I drove up to Lehi and it was kind of crazy. The interstate was very wet, we all made a splash. We drove 40–50 mph most of the way (sometimes a bit faster, sometimes even slower). It was crazy. Fortunately, driving up to SLC was better and the roads were all dry by the time I came home.

Today we heard that a lot of homes around us had some pretty bad flooding, so we did a full inspection of the house. It seems we were lucky, since only that one wall has some damp carpet at the edge. Our roof lost some shingles, and that tree came down, but other than a lot of leaves and branches scattered around, that's all we could find.

So we had a pretty exciting time with this storm! It felt a lot like Louisiana—the flooded roads and all. It was impressive. Who knew Utah could have this kind of storm?!

Hello?

This poor neglected little blog. I write and write and write all week long and this little fabulous blog gets no lovin'. But I figure I'll grace it with an appearance.

Since the last time I wrote, I've moved. I moved to be closer to work. And then work moved. I now have a commute, taking I-15 and everything. Fancy. My new apartment is great. It's a basement and there's lot of space and I have my own room and I share a bathroom with one other person and fridge with one other person and there are just 4 of us and I hardly see my roommates, so it's quiet. My new work office is pretty great too. It's big and bright. I think that's my favorite part—there's tons of natural light and big windows plus good lighting too. I have a smaller cubicle and I miss some of the people I used to sit closer to, but I guess it's okay.

Work is still decent. I'm pretty much sick of writing about handbags, dogs, cats, horses, and garden decor. I've been working more with helping with SMBs—small already existing businesses looking to start or change a website. That gives a lot more variety than the ecommerce sites I do regularly. I had several phone interviews to get information to write about this week. Some of them were helpful, some not so much, but hopefully we'll get better at this.

What else is new? I got a car. It's not new new, but it's new to me and that's pretty cool. Literally cool actually, because it has AC. Gotta love that. And a CD player. Such luxury. Makes that commute a lot nicer.

I just barely got a calling in my new ward. Sacrament meeting chorister. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. I subbed in that capacity my 3rd week there, but it's taken a while for them to call me. I was a bit surprised it took so long because they jumped on everything else: I prayed week 1, spoke week 2, and led the music week 3. So it took till month 3 for a calling? Whatevs.

This summer has been full of family, which is pretty cool. My extended fam came for my grandparents' 50th wedding anniversary, so I spent a bunch of time with them then, my parents have been down a couple times, I got to go home for Memorial Day weekend and the 4th of July and I'm going again in August.

I've also spent a fair amount of time scrapbooking, watching all seasons of Gilmore Girls, and most recently watching all the Harry Potter movies. SOOO GOOD. And speaking of which, my roommate's ready to watch the last one, so I'll say cheerio! Be fabulous.

Being a Working Girl

Sup.

Soooo....it's been a while since I blogged. That's pretty much because I didn't have anything exciting to blog about for a while, and then I got a job. And when I got that job, I didn't want to blog because I was writing all day.

But it's Saturday today so let me tell you about my job!

I got a job with Marketecture, a company which makes it easy to make and market your own website. They've created a website builder that is pretty simple to use and has everything you could want, which most similar types of things only have parts of: like e-commerce from one place, marketing from another, but with Marketecture it's everything rolled into one. Anyway, you can either buy the builder to create your own website, or you can say "here, make me a website," and that's where I come in. For people who want us to create site for them, I write the content. So the "welcome to our website, we sell this and this and this" stuff, then descriptions of the categories of stuff they want to sell, and then we do a blog post for them of about 500 words to get them started. It's pretty fun. Sometimes after writing all day I feel pretty dead but I sure learn a lot of random stuff.

Some of the things I've written about: camping gear (repeatedly), grills, outdoor fountains, outdoor furniture, cat supplies, pet carriers, home brewing kits, coffee makers, garden tractors, leather jackets, motorcycle stereos, horse supplies, play kitchens, toddler toys, pink products, all made in the USA products, sand blasters, pilot clothing, and more. Yep. I know all sorts of random things now.

Work is good. I like the company a lot. And I get free drinks and pebbled ice and oatmeal or Ramen as much as I want. And I work with a bunch of nerds so that's pretty fun. Sometimes we have nerf gun fights. So it's pretty great! I'm loving working there.

New Year Updates

I've wanted to blog a number of times. I have a bunch of things to blog about, but I needed pictures...and my computer isn't reading my camera card. So frustrating! So tonight I'm just gonna write a little update and we'll figure out the picture thing later.

I graduated! My diploma came in the mail today so now it's real! Now I just need a job.

I've been looking for jobs...loads of fun I tell you what. I've interviewed for two and got a call about another interview today. I tried to call back but he never answered, so I'll try again tomorrow. So far the jobs I haven't gotten I've been glad to not get. So the search continues.

I've been going to the gym and working out at home more often and it's been awesome.

I read David Copperfield. Really good. Really long. But really good.

I've been making a bunch of cards and am working to get an Etsy shop up and running (the camera card thing is being an issue with that) so I'll post again when that's going.

*I posted this on 1/23/13 but somehow it didn't stay posted...not sure what's up with that.