Glenn and I are FINALISTS!!!

Glenn and I entered a photo contest for engaged couples this week and through all odds we were one of the finalists! Awesome huh? It's supposed to be "A couple having fun together." I'm happy to report that I had lots of pictures of us to choose from! The one we chose is from a trip Glenn and I took to arches last summer with Sara and Eric, and Whitney and Eric. We camped and hiked lots, and it was my first time seeing the delicate arch. So we're trying to win the contest and would really appreciate your vote. You can vote on facebook, and their are two sites doing the contest and they total the votes from each site, so please vote on each one. Look for the Bride and Groom.com facebook page AND All Points Travel (Utah) and "like" their pages, then you can go to Glenn and I's picture, #7, and "like" it as well. Only likes count as votes, not comments... althought I would love to hear your comments as well! :) Thank you in advance!

Addresses!

Glenn and I have officially jumped in to the wedding plans with both feet! It will be held May 19th for sure and our reception will be that night in Salt Lake, with one in Idaho afterwards in June. We are having so much fun planning all the wedding reception stuff and we would love for you to come share with us! I'm busy collecting addresses (getting it done early so I don't miss anyone) but I know I don't have a lot of your current contact information, especially you high school friends! So if you haven't already heard from me and given me your address, in one form or another... email, text, facebook... and you would like and invitation please leave me your address or you can email it to me! Thanks everyone!

I'm Getting Married!!!

As many of you have heard, I’ve found Mr. Right, Glenn Barton, :) and we’re getting married! I figured you might want to see him and hear the proposal story, so here it is.

Glenn and I started ring shopping and we had decided to keep it a secret from all our friends and family so that when we finally announced we were engaged it would be a surprise… and really exciting. So we went to many ring stores to start figuring out what I even liked. I still remember walking into the first ring store and holding Glenn’s hand as he proclaimed “We’re here to look at your engagement rings!” Inside I was freaking out! Me? Ring Shopping!?!? ha ha. So fun! We finally started finding things that I liked and things I didn’t. Finally we went to Kelly jewelers that Jessica’s dad owns and I saw a beautiful ring there. I put it on… it fit perfect… it looked perfect on my hand… after we left the store I just kept thinking about it, and loving it. It was as if I had found my glass slipper.

So Glenn bought the ring and had it for almost a month and a half before he proposed. I was just waiting for the moment to arise. He asked me out on a “mystery date” on the night of Thursday December 16th. I had my suspicions that it might be that night. He wouldn’t tell me anything that we were doing… and I love surprises so I didn’t bother to try and find out. So he arrived at my house to pick me up with a vase of flowers. They were red roses and star gazer lilies, with a few Christmas additions of pine and holly. The bouquet he brought me on our first date was red roses with star gazers as well, although I didn’t know at the time that’s what they are called. But it was perfect cause they are so pretty and smelly, and they are called star gazers! So with an inkling that this might be a special night we took some pictures and left for our mystery date.


We drove to a restaurant in sugar house that we hadn’t been to before. It was an Italian places called Lugano. The place looked like an older home that had been fancied up. It was dimly lit with fake candles on the tables to give a “candlelight feel” we ordered our food, and it tasted REALLY good. We finished dinner and headed to our next destination.

We parked at the gateway and started walking. We walked into the Clark planetarium and went right up stairs, as we approached the dome theater a young man was waiting for us said, “welcome, right this way…” we walked into the theater and no one was in there. The “sky” was lit up a light pink. We chose the best seats in the house and the narrator, Holly, came to talk to us. She said, “Hey it looks like you guys are lucky! You have the whole place to your selves. Usually I tell people to turn off their cell phones… but you can take all the calls you want, just let me know if you want me to pause the movie!” ha ha. After she left I got Glenn to confess that he had reserved the entire planetarium for a special show for just the two of us.

We watched “The Ultimate Universe” all about how the stars and planets are created and interesting Universe facts. Then after it finished we did some “star-gazing” they put up the current night sky, what the sky would look like if we were to go outside and look. Holly narrated it, pointing out where constellations are in the sky as well as Jupiter, and a neat cat eye nebula that were visible as well. She pointed out Orion, The big and little dipper, then moved to another common constellation Cassiopeia, the Queen and her King Cepheus. I love the stars and constellations and everything to do with them. When Glenn helped me move right after we started dating one of the tasks was to put the glow in the dark stars back up on my ceiling. I love having them up, but there are a lot of them so it is no small task. I try to put up a few of my favorite constellations, so I told Glenn he could pick one out to put up. He put up Cassiopeia and Cepheus… the king and queen together in the sky. So they became our special constellations that we would look for in the night sky whenever we went star gazing. So, back to the story, as she brought up this special pair of constellations I got excited and nudged Glenn a bit. She brought up a visual depiction of the king and queen in the sky and said, “These two actually have a very unique love story… I’ll tell you about it.” Then a song that had become really special to us “Just the Way you Are” by Bruno Mars started playing the theater (a pretty instrumental version). I was a little confused and looked at Glenn, “Is that our song?” Before he could reply words appeared up on the dome screen…

“Cepheus and Cassiopeia: The Real, Untold Love Story

Not many people know the real love story behind this royal couple. It’s the kind of legend about which fairy tales are written.

Here it is…”

Glenn had written our love story in the form of a fairytale, a story of the constellations. A king and queen brought together for eternity. He included funny inside jokes, and special moments, tying in lots of pieces of our dating story. As our names appeared on the screen I began to cry (but don’t worry it wasn’t the ugly cry). Every piece of the story fit perfectly and had me smiling and laughing… on top of the crying. ha ha. The story finished with…

“The brilliance of their love flourished when they were together, but they still lacked the one element needed to join them permanently in the heavens. To be together, they needed to find a star with such perfect radiance that it could bind them forever. Such a star would be able seal them in the heavens for eternity. Fortunately they were able to find that star. It’s known as…The ARCTIC STAR!”

The name of the diamond center stone in my ring is called the arctic star. Awe... Then a bright star appeared on the screen and raised high into the sky, Glenn stood me up, took my hand and talked to me for a bit and then got down on one knee and asked me to spend forever with him. I of course said YES!

Afterwards, we were so happy as were Holly and Rob the people who ran the planetarium for us that night. We got a few pictures taken.


Then we went to the melting pot for dessert. While enjoying our food we decided to drive to Idaho that night (we ended up getting there at 2am) and surprise my parents in the morning with the good news.

The date is planned for sometime in May… possibly the 19th. I’ll let you know. It’ll be in Utah and then a few weeks after we’ll be having an open house for all our friends in Idaho.

And here are some pictures of the ring...

Here's the view from the side... one of my favorite parts. :)

A Pirate's life for me!

Sometimes Holidays come and go without us really feeling like we got to experience them fully… This was defiantly not the case with Halloween this year. I was on the committee to plan a Halloween party for my dance team and started getting into the Halloween spirit in September. Included in the Halloween excitement was recruiting my mom to make me a Halloween costume, just like old times (or really every time cause I’m never let her stop). She’s just so good at it. So we brainstormed a little bit and decided I would be a pirate. My mom had thought it’d be fun to make a costume like this for a while, so we both started doing our research. Once we had a good idea in our minds she went to work. For those of you who don’t know how my mom works… she is a perfectionist. And my dad described it best when he said, “Molly, she can’t just make a costume… it’s like she’s building the Statue of Liberty” And it’s all true… so I decided to showcase her fabulous work here! Keep in mind our deal was that I had to teach her Sunday school lesson so I went home one weekend and only had one fitting for the whole costume and she mailed it to me a couple days before my first party. Opening the box was like Christmas morning.

It was exactly what I wanted!!! She spent forever just making the jewelry that went with it. Check out the hairpiece and choker, they are both handmade. Also... after she spent weeks making this immaculate costume for me she made a Jedi costume for my brother... in one day. She's amazing. that's all there is to it! Thanks Mom! Love you Lots!

The Frist Snowfall...

Ah… the first snowfall of the year always brings a certain sense of joy to my heart. As does every subsequent snowfall!

I awoke today like any other day and got ready for work. I passed my roommate getting ready in the bathroom as I headed out, and she stated, “You better bundle up” in a dreary voice, and I said, “oh is it cold?” and she replied, “It’s snowing.” The most magical words that my ears like to hear. IT’S SNOWING?!?!?! Are you kidding? I ran immediately to the window of the door and peeked out with my hands on the windows to block the light (cause it was still dark outside) like a little kid as they peer out the window waiting their dad to come home from work… and sure enough there it was. The beauty of all beauties… a white blanket of sparkling wonderful. With little wonderfuls still falling from the sky. I came back away from the window to grab my real coat instead of my jacket I had on. I passed my roommate who was still dejected at the sight of the snow. She was obviously in denial… getting ready in her shorts and a tank top, still wishing for summer. She lives for summer, everything she is, is a summer girl. Me on the other hand… I love winter. Absolutely love winter. The image of snow falling, snow having already fallen, sitting inside and watching it with a fireplace and my all time favorite drink… hot chocolate, being outside playing in it… everything about it is wonderful.

So I was off to work and I my little heart couldn’t help be happy. It was like God had just surprised me with the best gift in the world. A silent prayer in my heart was that it would still be snowing or at least not have all melted away by the time I got off work. I remember having such thoughts when I had to go to school when it snowed. Ha ha. Once I got to work the snow was all the talk, but it seems everyone doesn’t like the snow as much as I do. Everyone was so bugged that it’s early and that it’s here. So sad. I was looking up the weather to see how long it would last and about died when I realized it was supposed to snow for two… DAYS! I love it! So then I went about my work, sneaking peeks out the window every chance I got. I had to walk over to the other building to work with another of my co workers. As I looked at the window the snow had picked up from a light snow to a light blizzard! So I bundled all the way up with my hood and winter coat and prepared myself for the trek. (They do have a shuttle you can take… but who would miss this opportunity?) I put in my iPod playing Christmas tunes.

Big Fluffy pieces of snow were falling all over and it looked like a perfect wintery movie. I lifted my head back and opened my mouth to catch a few pieces of the heaven. I even started singing out loud (after making sure no one was near) and the whole time I practically danced to the other building. I would pass people walking the other way, with their heads down and snow all over their face, they seemed extremely bugged by this gift of the morning. And I knew that I had this big dopey smile plastered on my face… and I couldn’t do anything to stop it. I could feel the grown up inside me saying… Molly, what are you doing? You’ve got to stop this! But the bigger (much younger) part of me would have none of it, she was way too tickled at the snow and she had taken over. I was a slave to my inner child. One man I passed I think noticed the big grin and said, “How you doing?” I replied with a “GREAT!” that was probably a little bit too loud and too enthusiastic.

So all in all the first snowfall of the year this year was picture perfect and as I told someone today I think it made me about a thousand times happier today! I went home and watched The Nightmare Before Christmas... compromising and not going for a full Christmas movie since it is still Halloween. I hope you all enjoyed the first snowfall as much as I did, or if you haven’t had it yet, look forward to it, it’s a gem.

Disney on Ice

Disney on Ice… the ice… the music … the magic. I used to go to Disney on Ice every year when I was little. My wonderful parents would bring the whole family down to watch it in Salt Lake and I remember looking through the programs for years and years after and dreaming of being in the show… or just looking as pretty as Tiger Lily. It has just always had a certain sense of magic. Maybe it’s just that Disney really does create magic. So this year I heard I could get discount tickets through my work and I was ecstatic! I bought my tickets almost 2 months early (through the pre-sale when they weren’t even available to the public). I have been counting down the days just waiting with my 12 year old anticipation and the night finally came. Brook, David, Brody and I all went to watch the magic unfold of Disney’s 100 year celebration. All the characters had their turn in the spotlight.

I figured I’d share some picture of my favorite parts. Aladdin came on stage and pretty soon was dancing with a rink full of genies, they were so fun to watch.

I also loved the toy soldiers from Toy Story bringing out the present that contained Buzz Lightyear.

The finale was impressive with all the characters out on the ice and fireworks!!

One of my favorite parts was the little girls! Lots of little girls were dressed up as princesses and I found myself a little jealous I wasn’t. I was, however, sporting my bright silver glitter shoes… which I did get some compliments from the little girls next to us. They also complimented my necklace. I realized that my style really does probably impress a little girl more than the regular crowd. I have a certain fixation on shiny things and I fit into that world so much better than my own. These little girls were super cute too. When a new character would skate out that they really liked they would scream at the top of their lungs… “NEMO! NEMO! BELLE! BEEEELLLLLEEE!” as if letting their best friend know that they were there and cheering them on. It was adorable I couldn’t help but laughing every time these girls let out a scream. They were acting for real how I was acting in my heart! All in all Disney on Ice was a fabulous night enjoyed by all and all my dreams came true.

Nightmare on 13th Street

So along with Halloween comes the joys of haunted houses… as many of you may know, haunted houses scare me to death, no matter how lame they are. The lame-o Terror Ride at Lagoon still scares me every time. Our folk dance team went to Nightmare on 13th street a few weeks ago. We all got paired up with our haunted house buddy. Mine didn’t quite know what he was in for. :)

We were waiting in line and it’s like an amusement park where they have the line snake back and forth a whole bunch in this room while you’re waiting, but they have stuff there to entertain you/scare you. So we’re not even in the haunted house yet and some loud noise goes off or something to scare me and I end up freaking out, falling and laying flat on my back… in front of everyone in line. Awesome. The kid I was with, Brian, helped me up and he says, “Just try to keep a hold of my arm okay?” I think he felt silly for not catching me, which he shouldn’t cause he had no warning but it was pretty funny all the same.

So then we are in the haunted house for maybe 1 minute and we are walking down a hallway and this guy starts running at us. So without even thinking I start running backwards (still facing forward)… faster than I even knew was possible, with super human strength… dragging Brian with me, which was a feat cause he’s a tough guy. Eventually there is no more hall and I slam into the wall…hard… with Brian, and fell to the ground. I look over and… I BROKE THE WALL. That’s right I ran us into it so hard it actually broke. Awesome. Brian helped me up and says, “Man I’ve got to hold on to you better!” I think then he realized just what he was in for on this little trip. Ha ha. The rest of the house went as usual scaring the crap out of me but I didn’t break anything else. Brian was a good sport to stick with me too and try to keep me on my feet, he did say it was the best haunted house he’d ever been to… probably cause he was laughing at me the whole time.