Thanksgiving 2004

Dad's folks were still in Russia, and Dad's work schedule plus Mom's school schedule were a little more hectic this year than last year. So, Mother and Father came to Provo to visit us for Thanksgiving. Our little 345 square foot apartment did not seem terribly inviting for a Thanksgiving meal, and so Mom, for the first time in her 5 years at BYU, joined the family for Thanksgiving at the Cannon Center. Yes, the Cannon Center. All four of us there, plus Amanda, if you count her in utero. The other big highlight of Thanksgiving weekend 2004 was the acquisition of Mom's Mac, a refurbished eMac which is still going as of Thanksgiving 2009.

Happy birthday, Dad! (2004)

Here's proof that Mom baked a cake for Dad on at least one occasion. This was Dad's third birthday with Mom, since Meet the Parents weekend back in 2002 included Dad's birthday. Also sometime around then, we got some actual snow. Not that Provo doesn't usually get snow at some point during the winter, but both Mom & Dad grew up in warm climates, so snow is pretty exciting, especially since a garage covered the entrance area to our tiny apartment, so we had no snow to shovel in our immediate vicinity.

Christmas Vacation 2003

Mom and Dad got to go somewhere for Christmas 2003: up north a few towns to house sit and cat sit for Dad's brother and family. After finals were over, Dad's brother gave us a ride north. Our student apartment at the time wasn't bad, but it sure was nice to get away to a "real" house (and its accompanying pantry). Our hosts left not long after we got there, and we settled in to enjoy it all, like the college kids on vacation that we were. After we'd memorized the house, we ventured out to the bus stop and made our way to a shopping center with a movie theater. We got ourselves a big book of Dr. Seuss stories that included "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" and then watched the third Lord of the Rings movie, thus completing the Lord of the Rings arc of our courtship story.

Mom's folks came up for Christmas, but didn't stay long because of weather concerns. In years to come, one of Mom's favorite things about living too far for her folks to drive was that people stopped changing their plans because of weather rumors. :) After they left, we lounged about some more until our hosts returned, just in time to save us from starvation after we'd eaten all their food. Mom also inadvertently spoiled their cats rotten with petting.

But, alas, the end of house sitting marked the beginning of a rough time for Mom: wisdom teeth removal. The dentist used a local anesthetic to remove the sideways-growing rebels, which meant that both Mom and Dad knew about most of the surgery. Mom's Uncle Jim gave us a ride home afterwards and helped us get prescriptions filled. We'd checked out It's a Mad, Mad, Mad World from the library somewhere around the same time, and let me tell you, that was quite a crazy New Year's Eve, living it up on yogurt and pudding while mostly passed out from pain and meds in Mom's case and waiting on Mom in Dad's case, all with a bizarre show in the background. Amazingly, we did manage to hear the fireworks when they started, and even staggered outside for a minute to see some. We also managed to regain consciousness by the time classes started up again a couple of days later.

Thanksgiving 2003

Our first Thanksgiving officially as family. With Grandma and Grandpa (Dad's folks) off in Russia, it was fairly easy choosing to spend the holiday with Mom's family (Grandmother & Grandfather). We stayed at their home for a few days and in that time enjoyed Thanksgiving, celebrated Dad's birthday (his second one with Mom's family), and even visited Grandfather's school class (once upon a time he was a school teacher for 30+ years, for all those out there who know him in his new career).

Our second apartment

Our first apartment served well its purpose of giving us time to find another place. Just a couple of blocks away, we found a nice place that felt like a serious starter home (it was still an apartment, though, in a different complex). The best feature was the view from the front window: a great big lawn . . . that belonged to the church building that was also on the block. There was a driveway running between our building and that lawn, but the driveway didn't show up easily in that view. It gave the illusion of living on a grand manor. It was a good thing we lived there when we did, because a few years later, after we were long gone, the church building had an extra wing added on that ruined the view from that living room window. Another interesting thing about our time there was that Mom's Uncle Jim (Grandmother's brother) moved in to the apartment right upstairs from us while we were there.