A thief, some crafts, and one heck of a Christmas party...

First things first. I know these pictures are a few weeks old but I thought it was still funny. One Saturday while Jayson was studying he looked out our patio window and caught a thief in the act... a squirrel was ripping apart our pumpkin and stealing our pumpkin seeds! Jayson said as soon as he looked at the squirrel, the squirrel looked back at him and froze. The little sucker knew he was in trouble. I don't know what it is about Nebraska but these dang squirrels are everywhere. They don't seem to be too bothered by people either, seeing as they climb on our planters and steal our pumpkins.

(I know this picture is a little dramatic.. but what can you do?)

Onto the crafts. I have finally finished my quilt that I started a few months ago. It turned out really cute and I absolutely love it!
My friend taught a few of us how to knit so I am now in the process of making my very first scarf! It has been a fun project to work on, especially since the past few weeks I have only seen Jayson for 20 minutes out of the day. So I turn on AMC (the old movie channel) and knit. I know, I know, it is a little grandma"ish" but it's pretty addicting.

Jayson and I finally visited the pedestrian bridge that connects Nebraska and Iowa. The bridge is right off downtown Omaha and goes over the Missouri River to a little residential area in Iowa. We went in the evening and it was such a pretty view of the city lights. It was a fun walk too, but a little chilly. We are starting to understand what they mean when they say "Nebraksa winters". There is hardly any snow, but it is freaking freezing. Tomorrow there is a high of 12 degrees and with the wind chill it will feel like -25!!! Are you kidding me?



The 10 Utah students (RDEP) that we came out with decided to have an "Ugly Christmas Sweater" party last night. I went shopping with 3 of the girls to the Salvation Army to find ugly sweaters. The selection was pretty slim but we did find some beauties....4 matching red and black Christmas dresses. We immediately thought of SNL and the Lawrence Welk show and had to get them! We did our best to represent the sisters and showed up to the party decked out! The party was really fun, everyone brought appetizers and desserts and we did white elephant gifts and played the name game (Jen-they had a fun twist that we will have to try sometime). The white elephants were great. Ranging from a signed speedo shot of one of the boys, an ancient brown lamp, xxx large panties, and some other interesting creations. Some of the boys tried to grow some "Christmas cheer" (aka facial hair) for the party.










Andy's Christmas cheer




Aaron and his sweater that he borrowed from Scott Hamilton (the ice skater)




Some of the girls (we had a few leave early)




Some of the guys




Our family portrait

(those of you who know the Clarks- Jayson claims that I look alarmingly similar to his Aunt Margie dressed like this)

That's it for now folks. We are headed to Utah this week and are so excited to spend time with family and friends.
Merry Christmas!!!

A vampire, a loss, and a little turkey...

Sorry for the lack of blogging folks, but our hard drive died a couple of weeks ago, and I have been so mad about losing all of our music and pictures I have been less than motivated. Luckily, I have printed off most of our pictures and I think we only lost a few. But we now have no back ups for any of the hard copies. All our music was on our ipods, but now we have 0 in our library. Anyway here is what we have been up to...

First order of business is of course the premier of Twilight! Although I am not a drooling fan (therefore did not attend the midnight showing) I went with a few friends to the Saturday matinee. We went to lunch and then to the movie theater about 20 minutes before the show. By the time the show started there were probably 30+ women from the Village (our little neighborhood comprised of 90% young LDS students and their families). It was so funny to see all these married women screaming for Edward. I thought the movie was really good. I loved the books and thought the movie was a good representation of them.




Since I am a true fan I will not skip over this next item of business.... BYU vs. the stinky Utes. We went over to our friends house who has the mountain to watch the game. Most of the time it was just BYU fans, but we did let 1 Utah fan slip in for a little while. It was really exciting in the beginning and then by the end we were almost laughing as Max threw the 5th interception!!!! What happened?! I know I it's good for the conference that Utah won, but let's be honest, they did not earn that win, it was handed to them on a sliver platter by our own quarterback. No matter the outcome, we are still fans and are excited for the bowl game.





Thanksgiving! We had originally decided to save our pennies for a trip home during Christmas and stay here for Thanksgiving, (mainly since gas was expensive and we didn't know how the weather was going to be for a drive home). Well, gas is now down to $1.50 and it has yet to snow here! We were sad to be away from family but very thankful for good friends we could spend Thanksgiving with. We were also thankful for a break from work/school and to spend time together.
We had dinner with 3 other couples at our friend's house. We split up the meal items and all pitched in to make a very good Thanksgiving dinner. After dinner we watched Get Smart and Leatherheads!


I made the Clark's traditional red cabbage- it was definitely colorful!


Stephanie made these darling turkeys out of oreo's


Kiley took on the big responsibility of cooking the turkey and she did an amazing job. It was delicious!



Targhee and Jayson eating all the turkey guts (aka. neck, liver, gizzard) Yuk!

We also hit up the movie theater during the break. We saw Quantum of Solace, Twilight (ok, maybe I am a drooling fan), and Four Christmases (not very good).

That about wraps it up for us. We are now eager to start celebrating Christmas and are excited to go home in 2 and 1/2 weeks!

Happy Halloween!

The teacher I work with was not at school on Friday and since we have zero parent involvement guess who got to plan the party? That's right, yours truly! The kids were crazy and a little hopped up on sugar, but it was a great day nonetheless :)



At our house we were bombarded with trick-or-treaters from 4:30-6 pm and then that was it! We ran out of candy and had to raid our pantry for fruit snacks, dove chocolates, and weird asian candy that I got at the asian market a few months ago :) We also went over to our friends house for her famous chili recipe (which was delicious) and then over to another friends to watch Iron Man. We were invited to a big Halloween costume party but Jayson (my Halloween scrooge) wasn't too pumped about it.


Me and the black kitties Ella and Emmie


The Teletubbies...


Rainbow Bright and an 80's rocker

First Gift of Christmas

While on the plane to Utah Jayson and I flipped through the SkyMall magazine. They have lots of cool gadgets and things. I found the thing I have been wanting since my second date with Jayson...

Several years ago while we were driving the Escape (R.I.P) I told him the only thing that would improve the car was seat warmers. I always joked that somebody had to make portable seat warmers. Well much to my happiness I found that SkyMall makes portable seat warmers that you hook up to your lighter in the car (and it was affordable too). I told Jayson that is what I wanted for Christmas.

Last week one night at dinner there was a knock at the door. It was the FedEx man. I asked Jayson if he ordered anything. He got a huge smile on his face and told me to hold out my hands and close my eyes......When I opened the package it was MY SEAT WARMER!!! I was so excited. Jayson said he gave it to me early so I could enjoy it for a month before Christmas. I use it every morning and it is amazing, just like the real thing.

Short but Sweet

Jayson and I flew home to Utah last Friday for Michael's farewell. It was short and sweet but totally worth every second! We got so excited flying into Salt Lake and seeing the mountains and the temples that dot the valley! Jayson's parents picked us up from the airport Friday night and we went out to dinner at our favorite little mexican restaurant in Centerville. We hung out at the house and went to bed fairly early since we had family pictures with my family the next morning at 8 am!





After family pictures on Saturday Jayson went golfing with the boys and the girls finished helping my mom get the food ready and then we went to Rumbi (which was especially good since there aren't any in Omaha). Jayson got to spend time with his grandpa and I went to Andrew's soccer game with the rest of the family. After the game we met up with cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents for pizza at the park. It was so fun to see my cousins, especially Val with her new little baby Rio! Sunday morning we helped my mom get all the farewell food ready (Cafe Rio pork salads). Michael was a little nervous for his talk Sunday morning but he did an amazing job! He gave such a great talk and was a really powerful speaker. I am so proud of him, he is going to be a great missionary in Canada. I am so excited for all the experiences he is going to have and I can't wait to write letters to him. I of course got a little teary on the plane ride back to Omaha. It was just so fun to see family and friends. Well... only two months till Christmas!

Little Projects...

Hi Vee (a local grocery store) donated over 20,000 trees to the Omaha public schools. Each student got to take one baby tree home and plant it. So I took one too!



We have named it our "love fern" and we are excited to see how much it grows in the three years we are here.




I also joined a quilting group! A friend of mine in the neighborhood makes darling quilts and is nice enough to teach all of us how to do it as well. I have started working on mine. Jayson took these pictures Sunday morning so that is why there are no pictures of my face :)




I have finished the front but am still working on the back.

Saturday Night Live...

Jayson and I a few Saturdays ago...


studying for the 4 mid terms he had the upcoming week.













After I was 0-5 in calling people to go to the stake center (30 min away) I ended up watching the Relief Society broadcast online. I was even singing along with the choir and Jayson kept laughing because apparently with the headphones I was a little off tune. Hooray for lds.org!

Visitors

Last Wednesday Jay Dee and Coleen (Jayson's parents) surprised us with a quick visit to Omaha. They decided to take a road trip to Mt. Rushmore and stopped here for an afternoon and evening. They got to see our house and took us out to a delicious dinner and of course a little shopping :) It was short and sweet but we were so happy they came to see us.

Dental Student

Jayson coming home from school one day. Notice the shirt pocket :)






I don't think we will be buying toothpaste or toothbrushes for a while...














Best treat ever...







Cantaloupe and ice cream. Mmmm

Back to Real Life...

I know many of you think that we have fallen off the face of the planet, but more correctly we are back to real life :(
No more vacations to post about...
Jayson started his fall semester of his sophomore year of dental school (supposedly the hardest semester of the 4 years) and after two months of lounging this summer I finally got a job and am contributing to society (sort of). I am working at a local elementary school tutoring kids in the 5th and 6th grades. It's not quite the same as in Utah, but we are in Kansas after all, right Toto?


As for pictures, here are a few from when my little baby brother came to visit us last month.



Congrats on going through the temple last night Mikey!
Sorry we missed it, but we will absolutely be there for your farewell.





Remember When...

Jayson transfered from Snow College to BYU and decided to walk on to the football team (2004), and then met the love of his life (mwa) through a blind date, we got married, I kept dancing as a Cougarette, Jayson came to the games to watch me instead of play (2005)

and then BYU needed a long-snapper and it turned out that was one of Jayson's hidden talents (2006)
and so I stopped dancing and got to go to every home game and a few away, and I got more nervous to watch the game, than Jayson did to play?

And then...
even though we were graduated (2007) we were the only true BYU fans in the Clark family and scored the highly coveted A&Z seats for every game????

Now (2008) we are sitting indian-style on the carpet in our family room inches away from the laptop listening to the online streaming of BYU radio and trying (me, more so than Jayson) to follow the plays. (no picture here, but use your imagination)
At least it was Greg Wrubell right?

Well whatever the circumstance, we are Cougar fans through-and-through. Whether it is listening to it on-line or helping our friend pay for the lame-o Mountain so we can watch the games way out here in middle America, we will do it!

Ok friends, that is it for now from the Clark house, look for another update sometime around Thanksgiving (depending on if we have visitors of course)

Called to Serve...

My darling baby brother, Michael, just got his mission call to serve in the Edmonton, Canada mission. He enters the MTC on October 29th. We are so excited for him and know that he will be an amazing missionary. Congratulations Mikey!

Lake Powell

Part of our crazy time in Utah was spent with my family in Lake Powell. We had 25 people, 1 houseboat and 2 ski boats! The weather was actually perfect, kind of cooler and with a few storms in the evenings. One night there was wild lightning and thunder and the rain was coming down slanted so we had to sleep inside. It was wall to wall people, my cousin even decided to lay down her pad on the kitchen table and sleep there! Needless to say we weren't up at the crack of dawn to water ski, we were a little tired! We had a wonderful time and thank you to my mom and dad for taking us! I have been to lake powell a million times, but it is still so fun every time.

The girls lounging on floaties behind the houseboat


The boys jumping off a scary cliff...


Grandpa Cline, 80 years old, what a trooper!


Jayson and Zeb tubing, what an amazing backdrop too!


Jayson


Surfing


Wakeboarding


Lili


Me, Grandpa and Holly


Carolyn and Jen reading