My Christmas Present to Myself: April 22nd through 26th, 2011

What a weekend! All my family got here either late Thursday, or on Friday.   Kerry and I went to work and no one had called in for the first three hours, so we closed up shop! We decided it wasn't good to work on "Good Friday", so we spent the day with the family. Friday night we all got together at the park with the Huntsmans and we decided to play a touch football game. We divided up the teams by putting all the people 20 years and older on one team, and all those 20 years and younger on the other team.   I quickly found out that people under 20 are much faster and in better shape than those of us 40 and older! Imagine that! I was gassing like a dog, and all the tweenieboppers were not even breathing hard. It didn't help that they convinced us they needed to have Mitch's dad be their quarterback. We relented and agreed. The problem? Mitch's dad was a collegiate quarterback and picked us apart all day. We had a bunch of 40 somethings trying to throw the ball downfield farther than their abilities allowed. So, two things happened. First, our passes looked like drunk, wobbling ducks, and we were intercepted about 500 times.   All-in-all, we didn't do too bad, however, and we scored 21 points to their 35, so at least it was respectable.   I think Kerry and I are going to stick to bike riding and let the tweenieboppers run the football field in the future, however.    Friday night all the teens and post teens got together at Kerrys and talked until the wee hours, so I'm glad I was at home not sleeping, rather than over at his house not sleeping.

Saturday we woke up early and went to the temple. The sealing was amazing! We had all of our family and a few close friends in the temple with us. Then, we walked outside and everyone else was waiting for us. Amber looked absolutely beautiful. We then went to the church and had a fantastic luncheon and we got to say a few words about Amber and Mitch. I started crying before I even began speaking. I am such a mushy gushy. When we were done we had to head over to the reception hall and finish up the final touches. We started taking pictures at 5:30, and by the time we were done there were already people at 6:45 lining up. We stood in line and greeted people for a straight 2 1/2 hours. My feet were so tired they felt like noodles, but it was great to feel of all the love and support from friends. At the end, I got to have the daddy/daughter dance with Amber and we laughed the entire time. The song was about 45 minutes long, or so it seemed, so once my legs fell off, we ended the dance.  I think I was supposed to cry, and not laugh, but Amber and I are a little different. We definitely laugh more than we cry, so why should it be any different when we're dancing? By the time we finished the reception it was about 10:00 and then my entire family came back and helped us clean up! It was so nice to not have to do it by ourselves. We were completely done and out of the hall by 10:45!   WOW, what a day! That was one of the best days of my life.

On Sunday we started our youth missionary day. We challenged the youth to live like missionaries for an entire week. No cell phones, TV, music, etc. They are to be home by 9:00, in bed by 10:30, and up by 6:30. They need to do 30 minutes of exercise, write in their journals, and say morning and night time prayers. They also were called to a mission (like Russia, Cost Rica, etc). They were challenged to learn as much as they could about the mission, and report to their families. Should be a fun week. We'll see.  I agreed to do it with them.

Monday and Tuesday were same-o-same-o.  I already get up at 6:30, so Kerry and I got up and rode for 21 miles and then when I came home from work Hunter told us about his mission (Chicago), and Logan told us about his (Russia). We then had a great Family Home Evening. On Tuesday we were again up early and Kerry and I again rode 20 miles and half way through the day we went up to see Logan and Hunter play soccer in Cedar. The varsity actually lost to Canyon View, which is akin to losing to a team of 4th graders.   It was quite humiliating.   Oh well, afterwards we got to eat waffles at IHOP, it doesn't get much better than that.

Here are a few early pictures of the wedding: