Alterations

When I was in California, my grandma Lynn bought me two super cute dresses, for $10 each! It was a steal and I was really excited to get them. I loved this blue one because I've been looking for a dress with the elastic band connecting the top and skirt. I can never find them that are long enough though! So even though I thought it would be a great one to wear to work because it was modest on top and a light dress, but it was just barely too short. 

I couldn't wear it without altering it, so I needed to change it. I found this great fabric at Joanne's that matched almost exactly! It was not the same type of fabric, but it was pretty stretchy like the rest of the skirt, so it would be restrictive. 

To add length to the skirt:

1. I matched the ends and ironed it so everything would lay flat and even. 

2. I figured I needed another 2 inches at least, so I added another one for good measure (haha sewing humor). I used this ruler to make sure I pinned at the 3 inch mark all the way down.

3. I pinned it down the length of the fabric and matched it to the hem of my dress. 

4. I sewed right above the hem so it would be even and the previous hem wouldn't be seen. And viola! My new dress:

Yay! I love it. And I was so proud of it, I just twirled around the apartment the night I finished it. I love that I have my sewing machine (that my wonderful husband got me for my birthday) and that I can do useful things with it! 

I want to learn more about sewing so I can make clothes for my family and fix modest dresses for my girls! It is such a good skill I can use for the rest of my life. I really like getting something basic, like fabric, and putting it together to make something useful. I feel so accomplished! Hopefully there is more in the future. 

Yogurtland

I work at Yogurtland! I helped open the Orem, Utah store in March of 2011, so I've been working there for just over 4 months. It is actually pretty fun, but I get a little tired of it. I'm a shift leader there, meaning I take the place of the manager when he is gone. I like it for the most part.... I just work long shifts till 1 in the morning, which is pretty rough when I have to get up to work at the Missionary Training Center the next morning. But, it is a good job and I get along with the people I work with. 

Usually Saturday nights are pretty busy, crowded with families out for a treat, teenagers with their friends, and adults out with their dates. Last Saturday was surprisingly busy, without any real break from 6 to 11:30 or so. But what made it extra exciting was our special guest who popped in...

Yep. That's Steve Young, the one and only. Of all 100000 yogurt places in the Provo/Orem area, he and his family came to ours! And I got a picture. Wooo! I felt like such a dweeb asking for a picture, but 1. I had to, and 2. my manager told me we had to get one (we have a picture with Jimmer on our wall, so we're starting a celebrity wall of sorts I suppose). But he was super nice about it and had his mom take the picture for us! 

And, the stinky part- I forgot to wear makeup that day. Oops! But at least I didn't have my visor on.... Then I don't even think I would post this. 

Adventures in B-town

Nate and I were able to go to visit his family in Boise over the 4th of July weekend. It was really fun being able to get away for a few days and hang out with them! It is only the two of them and their youngest, Logan, at home so it is much calmer than my house. We got there after about 6 hours of driving on the middle-of-nowhere roads between Utah and Idaho. 

We entertained ourselves with chatting and talking about whatever popped into our heads. I like road trips for that very reason! I love that we had lots to talk about for hours, on random subjects, just because we can. We're serious, we laugh, speculate, sing, dance, and joke. It's a great ride! But also another great part-- silence isn't awkward. I feel okay not talking sometimes. It's great to have someone to be with and even though you're not talking, you still love being with them. When I was younger I was always afraid I'd get bored of my husband because we'd run out of things to talk about. Granted, we've only been married six months, but I'm glad that I can stop worrying about getting bored with Nate for the next, oh, eternity. Phew! 

Pretty flowers in Idaho City!

We had lots of fun adventures in B-town. Thursday we went to Idaho City. It is an old, rundown mining town with museums, antique shops, historic homes and landmarks, speciality stores. There are probably a total of 300 people in the entire town. It was easy to tell the town is not the hopping place it used to be: every time we walked into a store, the store owners were super excited to see us, talk about their store, show us around, ask us about ourselves, etc. Even though we learned a lot about the mining history of Idaho City, my favorite was this old house we stopped by! 

It was so cool! At first it looked like a junkyard, there were just piles and piles of old stuff! And then we figured out there was some sort of a structure, so we tried to find the door to the store. Wrong. Finally we figured out it was a house that was no longer occupado. So we could only marvel at the doo-dads collected and take some pictures. 

Imagine trying to clean this place!

Awe cute!

 On our way out we stopped at a delicious ice cream shop. They were making homemade waffle cones, the scent just caught me so I couldn't think of any other kind of food. So we had waffle cone ice creams for lunch. Yum!

Friday we went to Municipal Park and played all day! Jason and Chantelle came with us, which was super fun! I was glad they joined us for the day. We put up a badminton net and played with this huge birdie and tennis rackets. Thankfully, it was less embarrassing than it could have been for me. We also played football and frisbee and went to the Nature park! We saw some animals, bugs, nature scenes. I got some great pictures! I love taking pictures of things outside, well, mostly flowers and trees. They don't move or make funny faces or run away like other things can.

Jason and Chantelle!

Fish pond at the park

Love daisies!

On Sunday we got to hang out and just played games with Nate's parents. We played Rummikub and a game where you guess everyone's favorite out of a hand of cards dealt to you--kind of like Apples to Apples but you pick their favorite instead of what they would think is funniest. Monday we mostly spent the morning getting ready to leave and hanging out with the family. We got back in Provo around 7ish and were tired of being in the car. We didn't really get see fireworks, mostly because we were tired and didn't care all that much! What a festive 4th of July!

Our Green Thumbs

We have started a little garden on our balcony, and we love it! It is so exciting and fulfilling to see the growth and change that has happened in the five weeks since we planted it. It took us a long time to get started: we wanted to wait until after finals, then after it got warm, then we couldn't decide what to plant, then finally we just found an afternoon where we had time and did it! We started out with strawberries, beets, sweet peppers, and peas.

The first day!

We kind of cheated with a strawberry start, but we have heard it is so hard to get strawberries to grow from seeds. I figure, we are beginners, so its okay to take all the help we can get. When we left for California, we only had a few little sprouts. While we were gone, it seemed that everything woke up from a deep slumber and decided to grow a little bit!

After we got back, we had a Relief Society Activity about self-reliance/the Law of the Harvest and at the end of the lesson we had them plant seeds as an illustration for "that which ye sew ye shall also reap." There I got a green pepper plant and a tomato plant (which, neither of us are crazy about tomatoes, but figured maybe we would eat them if they were home grown?). The green pepper plant was a little sad at first, but then a flower started to form! A good sign! However, all of the leaves whithered and fell off, probably not a good sign. So hopefully they are doing well and will pull through! The tomato plant could not have been more opposite! It is like we flipped a switch and all of a sudden it just sprung out of it's shell and grew to more than 2 feet tall!

the Newbies: green pepper and tomato plants

Our booming strawberry bush

Our sad squished beets

Sweet peppers finally poking out!

Sweet peas are just shooting out!

We're in Boise visiting Nathan's family, so hopefully our little garden doesn't shrivel up at our absence. And I had already started this while at home, don't worry I'm not that obsessed with getting this thing posted on all the time. I just wanted to finish when we had a bit of down time!