a late christmas report

This year, we had the pleasure of spending Christmas in Colorado with Beau's family.  Everyone was there (minus Brady on a mission in Brazil) and it was great relaxing and playing Bananagrams with the family!

It was fun having all the little cousins together.  I would have liked to have seen the outtakes of this series...

I especially like their symmetry.

Amelia and Emerson are the most easygoing and happy babies and didn't mind being passed around all the time. I am excited for them to grow up being friends and in 10 years maybe I can teach them to ride ponies together.

 Thanks to Beau's generous parents, we were spoiled in the gifts department Christmas morning. We got some camping equipment, cycling gear, and most notably... Vibram FiveFingers!

These babies are even better than I had imagined. Running has come to a whole new level, as documented here.

I thoroughly enjoyed the warmer-than-Utah weather, and went for daily walks with my friend Sammy.

We all had a great time and were sad to go back to real life.  Real life comes with looking for jobs, telling your boss you're leaving, looking for jobs, figuring out moving arrangements, and looking for jobs.  Beau wants me to include that he made cupcakes from scratch- red velvet.

There is so much color clashing in this picture I can hardly stand it.

We had a little sleepover at our friends house for New Years Eve, which I do have a picture but I will spare everyone because we all look really disheveled. And by "we all", I really mean me. And I have no shame so I'll put it up anyway to prove we have friends.

Also, we signed up for a free trial with Netflix and have watched The Sting, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Best in Show, Hunt for Red October, Food, Inc., Eight Men Out, and Everything is Illuminated. Swing Kids is in the mail.

Winter stinks.

ch- ch- ch- changes!

announcement one:

I cut my hair really short.

announcement two:

We are moving to the motherland, Northern Virginia, in early February.

No, we don't have jobs there (yet), but a large majority of jobs for Russian linguists are in the DC area. We'll be staying at my parent's house until we figure out what we're doing. Scary? Yes. Exciting? More so.

if anyone has not had the joy of flying with me...

... this will be me tomorrow at 8:05am as we are waiting to get off the plane in Denver.

parks and dickson- out!

After a combined 20 semesters, we are both DONE at BYU! Beau finished his last final today and never looked back. No more commuting to Provo every day, no more papers to write, and no more tuition.

(Don't worry about my independent study class- I just took the midterm and I am determined to be done.... soon.)

This was where we had our first conversation playing Stake Conference bingo. RIP Provo Tabernacle.

oh hey, december (notice a trend?)

Oh, blast. It happened again. Another month where I didn't post anything. If you are dying to view my wit and charm, head on over to the fitness blog, as I keep that up pretty well.

First up, I helped throw a baby shower for dear Anna. Thanks for the picture, Emily! We had fun making neat little appliqued onesies. I also learned what "appliqued" means.

This should be the first of several, as I have a few more pregnant friends and coworkers. BABIES!

We went for our last hike (without snowshoes, anyway) of 2010 up Butler Fork trail. Isn't it pretty?

Aiight Utah. Stop trying to win me over with your outdoorsy-ness.

I really need to do better about taking photos of things other than hiking or cycling. Because it really ends up looking like that's all we do. Not true! 

And then there was Thanksgiving. Best weekend ever. Started out with getting out of work early because of supposed "Blizzard of 2010". So we saw Inception at the dollar theater! So good. Luckily, we were able to traverse through the 3-4 inch snowfall to get home without any incident. Thanksgiving morning brought a little Turkey Trot. My partner in crime with the Mia Maids is even more crazy than I am, and we were able to convince some girls to come with us. It was COLD. But great!

I got home just in time for my favorite part of  Thanksgiving- the Purina Dog Show! I was excited that 3/7 final dogs were my very favorite breeds, but alas, the Irish Setter won it all.

Black Friday, normally something I don't participate in, lured me in with the promise of $20 gift cards for the first 150 people in line at REI. I am bought for a small price.

Our other crazy moment of the weekend was going on a group ride Saturday morning- the "Saturday Fatterday" ride. 30 miles from Saratoga Springs to Suncrest and back.

Winter cycling: colder than winter hiking or running. Wind plays large factor.

To give our apartment a little Christmas cheer, we put up our 2 foot Christmas tree (same one from the dorms, Kate!) and made some ornaments. Because we don't have any.

Isn't Beau's skiing santa cute? It is especially neat when you know that we didn't have any glue. That is all staples and tape, my friends.

Not pictured- trip to the Salt Lake temple, our attempt at cross country skiing, BYU's loss to Utah, and the viewing of Toy Story 3 and Enchanted.

Now it is back to work/school, with only a few weeks left in the semester for Beau! Hip, hip, hooray!

oh hey, november

Isn't this picture just the greatest? I know I already talked about Ashley's wedding, but her photos turned out so well I had to share more. Next time I get married I am using her photographer.

The whole fam. Well, until Page has her baby in a few months. It's so challenging to keep an updated family photo... Also, I love that even though all four of us got married in the DC temple, all of our group shots were unintentionally taken in different locations.

Dallyn sat on Ashley's lap for most of the morning, taking everything in. There were a million of Ashley's friends doing her hair and makeup all morning and Dally was a little overwhelmed.

Well that's my little Ashley wedding montage.

Sadly, I didn't really take any picture during our Halloween weekend. We went to Park City to spend time with several friends at their condo, playing games, watching the Sister Wives marathon (I don't recommend it) and making caramel apples.

Brittany and I are thinking about going into the business.

Oh, and my bike got stolen. That was fun. Bought a new one, that was more fun.

To prevent this blog from being all about cycling and running adventures, I created a fitness blog, appropriately titled justanotherfitnessblog.blogspot.com . Hop on over to read about our second century, the new bike, and the half marathon I did this past weekend.

 Peace out, homies!

three and a half seconds about life.

Three and a Half Seconds About Life from Eran Hilleli on Vimeo.