Christmas-y Weekend

What a crazy hectic week this has been! With papers and projects and finals looming in the distance, I was totally ready for the weekend which turned out to be even more amazing than I thought it would be.

Monday-At FHE we watched Elf, well, we watched part of it before we needed to go work on some homework.

Tuesday-I cleaned for cleaning checks and worked on homework.  Woo. Hoo.

Wednesday-We all passed cleaning checks! Yay! I had one of my freak-out days where I realized that everything (or at least it seemed like everything) was due the next day.  After my morning classes, I was going back in to work and discovered that there was nothing to do so I was able to go home and start on my homework.  Walking home, I was just getting really frustrated and stressed and wasn't enjoying my life at the moment.  So, to fix that I went on a quick run up Stadium Ave. in the cold (the best weather to run in, in my opinion) to clear my head and calm me down.  It worked. I took a quick shower and hunkered down to work on my 5 page biology paper. It only took 5 hours (of not very focused efforts) and 3 topic changes before I was done! I printed it off, put it in my folder and heaved a huge sigh of relief.  I also got my reading for History done, New Testament reading completed, and finalized my poetry project for Children's Lit. I was so glad for Wednesday to be over.

Thursday-I turned everything in and life was great :) After classes, Ben walked me home and I drove my roommates (well McKensey, Ashley and Brittany) up to Salt Lake for our Relief Society activity.  We went underneath the Tabernacle on Temple Square and were able to get a behind the scenes tour of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.  We got to see the dressing room with all of the dresses and jewelry.  We also learned about the story behind each dress. After we learned about the gorgeous dresses, we got to go up to their music library where they have the sheet music for all of the songs that they sing.  There are thousands, yes thousands of pieces of music in there.  It was awesome.  After that, we went over to the Conference Center and were able to listen to MoTab practice.  They sounded amazing! I had such a wonderful time.  But I think one of my favorite parts of the evening was definitely on our car ride home where we had a 45 minute roommate sing-a-long to Christmas music, country and even some pop songs.  It was such a great night.

 The rack of dresses!

 One of the many moveable shelves of music in the library. 

 Christmas decorations at the Conference Center 

 The Choir practicing

Me with McKensey, Brittany and Ashley by the reflecting pool

Friday-I went to the Temple with Emily in the early morning and took a quick nap before work.  After work I got Jamba with the lovely Alex and Sydney and we caught up for a bit.  I went home and worked on my art project for many hours and I read a little bit too.  I got my first piece of international mail! The lovely Elder Ray sent me a letter and it made me very happy. :) Ben came over and we ate dinner with my roommates (I made a mac and cheese bake that was soooo yummy).  After that, Ben and I went to the library to watch It's A Wonderful Life. We got to watch James Stewart's personal copy! It was such a good movie and I am sad that I had never seen it before! I absolutely loved it and I think I have found a new favorite Christmas movie. Watching it every year will definitely be a tradition I want to continue.

Saturday-Saturday morning Emily and I went grocery shopping followed by going to her flute recital.  She did such an amazing job! Emily is so talented and I was so impressed with the piece that she played. After her recital, we grabbed some lunch at home before she went with me to get gas and the oil changed in my car. After that I went over to Ben's brother's house to hang out with Ben's entire family who came into town Friday evening. It was super fun talking to his mom and meeting the rest of the family.  We all went out to dinner at Costa Vida (YUM!) and then to White Christmas which was being preformed at BYU. The play was awesome.  I also have never seen White Christmas and now I would really like to see the movie.

The whole Nielsen family

 The whole Nielsen family minus Gordy plus me

Sunday-Ben and I went up to Salt Lake with his family for his nephew's baby blessing.  It was so much fun seeing all of his family together and I got to play with the baby for a lot of the time :) After church, Ben and I went to Temple Square to wait in the stand-by line for the First Presidency's Christmas Devotional.  It was phenomenal. I love the leaders of our church so much! After the devotional, we walked around Temple Square and looked at the lights.  It was sooo cold but so much fun.

 At the Visitor's Center

 Aren't the lights amazing?!