A whole lotta catching up...

As I was driving to work this morning, I took note (as I do on most mornings) of a homeless man with a cart who walks up University Avenue every day. And every day, I wonder, "Where is he going? Why is he homeless? Is he cold?" ...and many other questions spring to mind. For three years, I've been coming to work early early in the morning and I see this man. And this morning I thought, "Why am I so blessed and this man has nothing?" I look at my cush life and a flood of thankful thoughts comes to my mind. Wow, I'm grateful for a place to shower every day. I'm grateful for a job and a house and all the other big things. And the little things, too. So why is it that I want for pretty much nothing and this man I see walking has almost nothing? Makes me think of the responsibility that I have to society...I can't just be enveloped in my own little world of self-pity (why isn't my shirt that I ordered here yet?! who put raisins in the stuffing on Thanksgiving?! why don't the garbage bags fit my garbage can?!). I have to buck up and realize that there are bigger things in life than the rising cost of gasoline and what got deleted off the TiVo before I could watch it. Don't I sound spoiled! It's amazing what a little thinking can do...sorry to get all philosophical on you!

As for life, it happens so fast! It's been a couple weeks since I've posted, and so much has happened! Firstly, Adrianne's wedding was great. The weather held out just long enough to get some fantastic pictures and we got her all cinched up in that dress about 14 times. :) I'm glad I was there to help out. Gives me a sense of purpose. I ate WAY too much cheesecake and probably slacked in some of my duties, but it was fun to see her and Michael and how happy they were. Here's a picture of her and me at the temple.

I got to meet or re-meet a lot of her family, and we got along so great! I have new blog friends now (hi Dev and Brit!)...we went to Cafe Rio after the Salt Lake reception and had such a great time.

I'm actually friends with Brittany through stamp club. We meet once a month and make cards with rubber stamps and ribbons and markers. I'm new to it, so I'm not the best yet, but I have a good time! Here is the card I made this month. We also made ornaments (glued my fingers together doing that!), but I don't have a picture of that. It's hanging on my tree, though! I'm sad because the club was clear up in Layton, so Adrianne and I decided that we were going to find one closer to our geographical location. Brittany...we will still stamp, no worries. :)

Thanksgiving was great. We had my dad's side of the family over, and that means one thing: PIE. Holy cow, people, there were probably 30 pies for around 45 people. Talk about abundance! I ate pie for about three days straight, no joke. After Thanksgiving dinner, my family has this tradition where we go see a movie. This year it was Enchanted. It was a pretty cute movie! Cheesy, yes. Predictable, of course. But it had Patrick Dempsey in it; need I say more? I do love Thanksgiving. All the eating and the preparations and the football and the family...it's just so right. And I got to sit next to my nephew who is a barrel of laughs. He was telling everyone about his asthma medication and how it works...and he got it right! He's only heard about it once, but that boy's mind is like a steel trap. Here are some cute pictures of him. I think the funniest thing that happened was the day after Thanksgiving. Let me preface with this...when you have almost 50 people to dinner, things get a little hectic. So much food is being passed and plated and prepared and all over the place. The next day, we were making some lunch and my sister, Sarah, turned on the oven to cook some cornbread. She opened the oven to put it in...and there were two pans of stuffing in there. We had completely forgotten about them from the day before! What a waste of good stuffing. :( I did, however, get out of the Snow family tradition of hauling three bazillion chairs out of the church the day before Thanksgiving and then hauling them back the day after. Don't ask me how I pulled off that feat!

I also went to the Silverchair concert last weekend with my friend, Lynne. I won the tickets on the radio! It was amazing! Some bands are not so good live. Silverchair was awesome! And they even played my favorite Silverchair song, Ana's Song. Their lead singer, Daniel Johns (I just had to look that up...), was fantastic...he was playing the guitar with his teeth. I'm not even kidding. And his pants were the tightest pants I've ever seen on any human being--ever. Here's a picture of that. The concert was at a club, so it was smoky and people were so drunk, but we had such a good time. We were standing on the balcony, and there was one girl who kept trying to walk down the stairs, but she fell down them. I thought it was a clumsy moment the first time and I felt kind of bad for her...and then I saw the same girl fall down on the stairs again and I realized she was completely drunk. This made me think two things: wow, Annie, you are pretty sheltered that you've not been witness to someone like this before; and: wow, that girl needs someone to cut her off! But I saw her a few minutes later walking UP the stairs (she made it this time!) with another beer. Anyway, if you get a chance, I highly recommend listening to Silverchair's new album, Young Modern. Thank you, Natalie, for introducing me to it.

Then on Saturday, I found myself once again in Salt Lake...for a blind date. Don't get me wrong, I'm all about the blind dates (I'm WAY more about the ones that are not set up, though), but it was a little bit awkward. I love Laura, my friend who set us up, so I don't begrudge her at all. It was a married couple, two "dating" couples and then this guy and me. Her boyfriend's friend's date (did you catch that?) fell through, so I was the alternate. It was fun going up to Temple Square, and I got to ride TRAX, which I've never done before. I tried my best to be polite and ask things about him and get him out of his shell...he was not having it. I think he's shy. But it was one night. I doubt I'll ever see him again...and that's ok.

As for this week, I've just been trying to get back into the normal routine. I did kick my friend Ben's trash at Settlers of Catan, so that was good. And I finished Adrianne's quilt (don't have a picture...hmmm....) for her wedding. I also started in on holiday baking...if you can call it that. I tried making a batch of fudge and it turned out fabulously. I've had problems with the recipe in the past, but I got it to work this time! Practice makes perfect. Now I've got to get practicing on pie crust. I also worked on my quilt blocks for quilt club (I'm realizing how much of a nerd I am as I type all these things I do...oh well...I sure like doing them!) and got those finished last night.

Now I've got to get ready for a pretty busy weekend. Relief Society Retreat is tonight and tomorrow morning and then I've got quilt club, a luncheon, a reception, and a concert tomorrow. Whoo! Busy busy! It's good, though. I'll be sure to write about those events on here, too. :)