Merry Christmas!

Please take a look at our Christmas card at http://arclite.byu.edu/dan/christmas2008.

A Little About Us

Rules are: Anything you have done has to be in bold. How much have you done?

(PS Daniel is in red, Stephanie is in blue, both is in purple)

1. Started your own blog (umm...you're reading it)

2. Slept under the stars 

3. Played in a band

4. Visited Hawaii

5. Watched a meteor shower

6. Given more than you can afford to charity

7. Been to Disneyland 

8. Climbed a mountain

9. Held a Praying Mantis

10. Sang a solo 

11. Bungee jumped

12. Visited Paris

13. Watched a lightning storm at sea 

14. Taught yourself an art from scratch (I learned piano from scratch)

15. Adopted a child 

16. Had food poisoning (on the mission, you'll eat anything once)

17. Been to the Statue of Liberty 

18. Grown your own vegetables 

19. Seen the Mona Lisa at the Louvre 

20. Slept on an train 

21. Had a pillow fight (yeah...Stephanie won)

22. Hitch hiked 

23. Taken a sick day when you’re not ill 

24. Built a snow fort 

25. Held a lamb 

26. Gone skinny dipping (I must have been less than 3)

27. Run a Marathon 

28. Ridden in a gondola in Venice 

29. Seen a total eclipse 

30. Watched a sunrise or sunset 

31. Hit a home run 

32. Been on a cruise 

33. Seen Niagara Falls in person 

34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors 

35. Seen an Amish community 

36. Taught yourself a new language (just about every semester!)

37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied (less about money and more about attitude)

38. Seen the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person 

39. Gone rock climbing 

40. Seen Michelangelo’s David

41. Sung karaoke 

42. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt 

43. Bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant

44. Visited Africa (I lived there for two years!)

45. Walked on a beach by moonlight 

46. Been transported in an ambulance

47. Had your portrait painted

48. Gone deep sea fishing 

49. Seen the Sistine Chapel in person 

50. Been to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris 

51. Gone scuba diving or snorkeling

52. Kissed in the rain 

53. Played in the mud

54. Gone to a drive-in theater

55. Been in a movie 

56. Visited the Great Wall of China 

57. Started a business 

58. Taken a martial arts class 

59. Visited Russia 

60. Served at a soup kitchen 

61. Sold Girl Scout Cookies (delivered them is more like it)

62. Gone whale watching 

63. Got flowers for no reason 

64. Donated blood, platelets or plasma (donated once before going to Africa...now they won't accept my blood)

65. Gone sky diving 

66. Visited a Nazi Concentration Camp 

67. Bounced a check (it only takes once to learn that lesson...by the way, this was before we were married!)

68. Flown in a helicopter 

69. Saved a favorite childhood toy 

70. Visited the Lincoln Memorial 

71. Eaten Caviar 

72. Tied a quilt 

73. Stood in Times Square 

74. Toured the Everglades 

75. Been fired from a job

76. Seen the Changing of the Guards in London 

77. Broken a Bone

78. Been on a speeding motorcycle (30 mph in a 25 mph zone)

79. Seen the Grand Canyon in person 

80. Published a book 

81. Visited the Vatican 

82. Bought a brand new car

83. Walked in Jerusalem 

84. Had your picture in the newspaper 

85. Read the entire Bible (seminary)

86. Visited the White House

87. Killed and prepared an animal for eating (fish)

88. Had chickenpox 

89. Saved someone’s life

90. Sat on a jury 

91. Met someone famous (let's see who frequents the BYU laundry...LaVell Edwards, Bronco Mendenhall, Susan Tanner, Sister Samuelson with a bad hair day, the list goes on...)

92. Joined a book club

93. Lost a loved one 

94. Had a baby (we're almost there!)

95. Seen the Alamo in person 

96. Swam in the Great Salt Lake (umm, no thanks)

97. Been involved in a law suit 

98. Owned a cell phone 

99. Been stung by a bee 

100. Visited Italy

We would love to see what you have and haven't done!  We can't wait to see!

This week has been a very nice week. It was busy (as is typical), but we got the opportunity to be busy with more fun activities this week than usual. We are on the activities committee for church and our ward had our Christmas party on Tuesday evening. This activity was particularly nice for us because it was catered and we didn't have to worry about any cleanup! Stephanie and I participated in a short musical program by playing What Child is This, but otherwise we were able to sit back and enjoy the ham!

Friday, Mom and Dad came down to Provo to do a double date with Stephanie and I. We went to the Marriott Center to watch BYU's Christmas Around the World production. It was a lot of fun to see the culture and the excellent dancing, and we enjoyed having Mom and Dad around.

Two of Stephanie's bosses at work are involved with the Festival of Trees, and we had the opportunity to volunteer there yesterday. I had no idea regarding the scale of this event, but it was huge! Families and businesses donate to the event everything from decorated Christmas trees and homemade wreaths to gingerbread houses. In turn, families and business purchase these creations and the proceeds go to Primary Children's Hospital. Stephanie and I were in charge of watching the gingerbread houses, and let me tell you, there were some amazing creations. One of the houses must have been 150 pounds!

Now we just have to survive one more week of classes followed by a week of exams and then we will be free for Christmas break! We love everyone and hope you're having a wonderful Christmas season!

Happy Thanksgiving

We had a wonderful week this week. We didn't have class on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, giving us more time to...work and do projects! No, but seriously, we had much more time to be together and we took the WHOLE day off on Thursday. We enjoyed a Thanksgiving feast with Grandma and Grandpa Coleman in their new house in Santaquin. There was food, games, pie, and I ate WAY too much...everything you could want in a Thanksgiving!

We also took advantage of some of the sales on Black Friday. We first went to the Provo mall to use up our last wedding gift card at JCPenny, then we went and did some shopping for each other at Target and WalMart. It was funny shopping for each other while we were together--I had to restrict Stephanie to the women's apparel section while I went and bought her gift. I took it out to the car, then went and waited in the electronics section while she went and bought my gift. You do what you gotta do when you're married!!! (you know we wouldn't have it any other way!)

In other news, Stephanie is 28 weeks today, which means she is officially in the 3rd trimester! It's hard to believe that we're less than three months away from having our first child! At times it seems so short, although at times we wonder if we can handle another three months of pregnancy!

We have so much to be thankful for--our health, our opportunities, our friends...but mostly our wonderful family. We love you!

Wonderful Weekend

After a typical long, busy week, Stephanie and I enjoyed a great weekend. Stephanie usually has dinner nearly complete by the time I come home from work at 6pm, but Friday dinner wasn't just nearly complete. She had spent some extra time making a wonderful fish and rice dish, placed it in serving bowls (rather than right out of the pan like we typically do), set up the dinner table with candlelight and roses, and was just finishing up all of the dishes that had been stacking up throughout the week. I knew it was going to be a good night! Little did I know that cheesecake would be following the meal!

After dinner, we cashed in on some discount tickets for the BYU basketball season opener at the Marriott center. The Cougars were a bit rusty from the off-season, but we still managed to pull off a victory. It was fun to see Steve, Erica, and their kids there as well.

Last night we were planning on attending a play on campus, but the tickets were sold out. Our backup plan (movie rental from the BYU Bookstore) also fell through since the bookstore closes early on Saturday. We resorted to picking up a half-gallon of cookie dough ice cream from the creamery and playing Scattergories while watching Guys and Dolls. We had a good time, but by the time the movie was over we were ready to crash and recover from the week.

We were very grateful to sleep in this morning. We had choir practice at 10am, church at 12pm, and aside from a short home teaching assignment, we spent the rest of the day in the kitchen. We made pepper steak for dinner (thanks to Uncle Charlie for the elk steak), zucchini nut bread, and rice pudding with rice left over from dinner (much better than our previous attempt). We're set for breakfast this week!

We're thankful for all that we have, especially our wonderful family and friends. We love you!!!

Tag, You're it!!

This tag was kind of fun. What you do is go to your picture folder, open the fourth folder, and find the fourth picture, and then post it. This was ours.

This was a picture that we took while we were visiting the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta. I'd say we look a little fishy, what about you?

Halloween

Daniel and I are on the activities committee in our ward, and we were able to help plan the Halloween party this year. It was a great success! We were unable to schedule the church, so we ended up doing it in the Quad. That turned out to be a blessing because we were able to invite more people in, even some non-members. Everyone had a great time!

We did a chili cook-off, trunk or treating and lots of prizes! It was a great night. This is my favorite picture. Daniel is announcing the winners of the contests...with someone mysterious and kind of scary looking at his side (another activities committee member).Daniel and I were a Doctor and Nurse for Halloween. That is what we were supposed for the party pictured in the last post, but I just did NOT feel like dressing up. This time, I did. It was fun, and everyone kept joking that if anyone got sick from someone's chili, we could fix it. I think the most I would do was tell them to drink TONS of water and let their body handle the rest...It's probably a good thing I am not a nurse...

PS. We are smiling in the picture. It is just hard to tell.

"Great Works" of Halloween

As an Honors program participant, I am required to have a certain number of "Great Works" experiences involving classic works of art, literature, music, etc. The Honors program often puts on activities that help students fulfill these Great Works experiences, and Friday night Stephanie and I attended one such activity. It was a Halloween party with a few games, tons of candy and cookies, and a showing of the classic film Bride of Frankenstein.

The games were kinda lame (it was mostly freshmen, what can you expect? see Figure 2), and the movie was almost too amusing to be considered a great work of art (it sure is classic though). It was fun anyway. We were, however, encouraged to come in costume, and our costume "the doctor and the pregnant lady" was very popular--we won the award for the "Authentic" category (see Figure 1), the prize of which was to relieve the Honors program of some of their extra candy. It was a good little inexpensive Friday-night date.

Figure 1: The "doctor and the pregnant lady" was a big hit. I think Stephanie is a "great work" of art!

Figure 2: Stephanie is trying to figure out these freshman, and I am helping the Honors program not to waste their cookies and frosting!

I'm Back!!!

I had my first business trip this last week. Part of my responsibilities at work involve research with standards for web-based learning. This past week my boss and I attended a conference in Pensacola, Florida to and discusses some of the research we have been doing. It was really nice to be right on the beach, although I didn't have a chance to go--the only time I wasn't busy it was raining! Anyway, it was a great experience. I must admit, however, that I am glad to be home with Stephanie. It's not easy being apart for that many days, especially since she's pregnant. We celebrated with a romantic date night after she picked me up from the airport last night!

Stephanie is now 22 weeks along...She's still pregnant...It's still a girl...She's still a full time student and part time employee...and full time wife. All things considered, she's doing pretty well!

Whoaa we're halfway there!

Stephanie is 21 weeks today. That puts us just over halfway there!

About Daniel...

Name & meaning: Daniel Scott

I am not exactly sure why Mom and Dad named him Daniel Scott... BUT, according to babynames.com, Daniel is Hebrew and means "God is my Judge," and Scott originates in England and means "Of Scottish Origin." I didn't feel like doing anymore research, so that is the best you are going to get.

I do have kind of a funny story though...Right after we got home from our honeymoon, Mom and Dad Standage helped us lug our gifts into the apartment, and put things away. Daniel was in the other room, and Dad came up and asked me, (ok maybe this isn't exactly the way it went, but it was something pretty similar) " So, do you call Daniel Dan, or Daniel?" I was a little surprised and replied that I call him Daniel most of the time. Dad then said "That is good, because in our family we call him Daniel."

Apparently, when Mom and Dad named him, they always wanted Daniel to be DANIEL. I personally like Daniel better than Dan, but if we are around people that call him Dan, I call him Dan...especially when I need to get his attention.

Age: 23

Nicknames: Dan (mostly used by Utah people who tend to be lazy and shorten names...meaning no offense, I do it too), Honey, Handsome, he is my Knight in Shining Armor, Mr. Incredible, and the most used by me: My Hero.

Favorite Activities: He loves computers, and he likes learning about new technology; playing, singing, and listening to music; he likes to cook every once in a while; he likes the outdoors when the weather is good; most of all he likes to come home and cater to the needs of his dearest, most lovely, pregnant (and unfortunately sometimes grumpy) wife.

Favorite Foods: Enchiladas, baked beans and cornbread, cheese, fresh fruits and veggies, anything with sugar in it, he will pretty much eat anything I make...which either means that he is easy to please, or I am a VERY good cook (which I really don't think is the case).

Least Favorite Foods: He really isn't picky. Celery isn't his favorite, but he eats it; he had a bad experience with too much stringy, melted cheese once, so he sometimes has a hard time with lasagna, and homemade macaroni and cheese.

Favorite Music: John Mayer, U2, Mo-Tab, Classical (especially Mozart "because leading experts say, Mozart makes babies smarter").

Favorite Toys: he likes playing with his best friend (me. However, I do not consider myself a toy), computers, and his guitar.

Favorite Book: I can't really say I know what his favorite book is. All I have ever seen him reading is his scriptures and textbooks. I'd say out of those two, the scriptures are probably high on the favorite list. He also likes the Chronicles of Narnia.

Favorite Item of Clothing: He likes to dress business casual, but I don't really know what his favorite is. MY favorite outfit is a tie between his dark blue shirt that dad gave him, and the lighter blue shirt that Uncle Eric gave him. I like it when he wears either of those shirts with his tan pants.

What Makes Him Happy: Feeling like he has accomplished something, getting good grades, eating ice cream, music, ME!

What Makes Him Sad: not having enough time in one day, feeling overwhelmed with all of his responsibility (which he handles very well), he is most sad when I am sad.

Additional things I love about Daniel: His hard work and willingness to serve, treating others with respect, his eyes, his commitment to the gospel and trying to do the right thing, or Christ like thing all the time, his sincerity, treating me with love and respect even when I am ornery, making me feel like the most beautiful princess in the world.

It's a...GIRL!

After a busy morning, I finally have a chance to slow down and share some exciting news with everybody. I'll just cut to the chase...we're having a girl!!!

Stephanie and I made a trip to the radiology clinic this morning for her first ultrasound. Although our baby was good at striking cute poses, apparently they weren't the kind of poses that made it easy to take the required measurements! Despite the lack of cooperation on her part, we were able to figure out that she's a girl.


Now that we know we're having a girl, we can get serious about names. We've thought about Heather Breanne and Victoria Breanne (Tori for short). We'll just have to see though.


We love you everybody!!!

That Time of Year

It's that time of year again! No, not the time for caroling and feasts. It's the time for General Conference. And that means...Stephanie's family is coming to Utah! Since Dad is a chaplain, the church makes sure they get a few tickets to each session of October conference. Plus, the chaplains and wives get together for their own additional meetings. It's good to have them with us, although they have a lot of other family fighting for their share of time with them as well.

A lot will be happening between now and then. Stephanie is halfway finished with a battery of midterm exams, and I have major assignments due in almost all of my classes this next week. Hopefully we will still have a little energy by the time Stephanie's family arrives on Friday.

The week following conference, we will be going in for Stephanie's 20-week checkup. And that means...ULTRASOUND!!! We are excited to know the gender of our baby. We've been thinking about names a little here and there, but once we know what we're having we'll get a little more serious about the name. We'll make sure we keep everyone updated when we get the news.

We love you all! Have a great week!

Kids

Stephanie and I are expecting our first child in February. Yesterday we got a chance to practice with a baby boy and his 3 older sisters. Ben and Juli got their hands on some BYU football tickets, and we had the chance to watch Emily, Sadie, Katelyn, and Jacob. Emily and Sadie had just finished a soccer game, and came in their bright team garb.

We had fun having lunch, playing at the playground, playing card games (Sadie is vicious at Old Maid), and having milkshakes. We mixed some of the apricots and cherries Mom gave us recently with some frozen strawberries, a fresh peach, and milk. The girls really enjoyed the treat--good thing we didn't let them know it was healthy!

In the end, we're still excited to have a kid, although we'd prefer to start off with one rather than four all at once! We'll get to that point some time!

We love you all. Have a great week!

The good old days

This past couple of weeks have been pretty crazy. While it has been nice to get back into a schedule, and start school, it has also been pretty tough. It has been hard to adjust to the new schedule, and to the demands of my body due to the little baby growing inside...for both of us! I have evening classes four days a week, and Daniel has lots of homework, and work to do. By the time I get home at night, I am completely wiped out and ready for bed, and Daniel still has miles to go before he wants to sleep. He has been very kind in letting me have my early bedtime, and instead of staying up late, he gets up super early (4 or 5am!).

In stake conference last week, our stake president made the comment that even though these times are hard, we will look back on these times as the "good old days." He mentioned that we should live our lives like they already are the good old days. We are trying! Daniel has definitely made my days good, by sacrificing his time to do small things like doing the dishes or getting breakfast ready. I have really come to realize how blessed I am. He makes so many sacrifices to make my life easier, and I really appreciate it.

We love you all and hope that you have a happy and productive week.

Bioinformatics...that's, uh...what's that?

There is an internal struggle every time someone asks me what I am studying at college. I learned very quickly that a small percentage of people have heard of bioinformatics, and many don't even grasp what it is after a quick explanation. I've reverted to just telling most people I study biology. 

One of my professors just received a hard drive in the mail from a scientist he works with.  The hard drive has 800 gigabytes of human DNA data that needs to be analyzed.  Most biologists wouldn't even know how to begin looking at that many billions of lines of information.  This is a problem that only bioinformatics can solve.

Both biologists and computer scientists are generally considered 'geeks', and I plead guilty on both counts.  To be honest, I find both subjects to be very fascinating.  If I'm going to be spending 8 hours per day working for the entirety of my professional life, I might as well be doing something I like, huh?

I'm just thankful for a wife who loves me and supports me.  She loves to hear about my studies, even though she doesn't pretend to understand much of it.  I am so blessed to have Stephanie as an eternal companion.

Speaking of Stephanie, she's had a few bad days this week.  Her nausea hasn't completely gone away yet, but it's not as much of a problem right now as her headaches.  We're really hoping that the relief of the second trimester will come soon!

We love you all!

My World is Spinning

Yesterday I had some pretty bad dizzy spells, some of them getting so bad it literally felt like the world was spinning. The dizziness began causing nausea, and after an international fare lunch with the College of Humanities following a conference, I had an international fare stomach ache. I left work early and came home for a three hour nap.

Looking back, I've been dealing with dizziness for a few days. Recently at work I've been getting small headaches and short dizzy spells. I'm not prone to headaches, but these I could shake off by closing my eyes and relaxing for a few seconds. Yesterday it got a lot worse.

This morning I have still been dizzy, although it hasn't been bad enough to cause nausea yet (thank goodness!). Nevertheless, I made an appointment and visited the doctor. Turns out that there is some weird stuff going on in my inner ears. She wasn't sure if it was labyrinthitis, leftovers from a viral infection, or a combination of the two. Either way, I got some meds and strict orders to stay hydrated and well fed.

Every story has a bright side. I'm feeling a little bit of what Stephanie has been feeling for almost 3 months now. This has helped me appreciate her efforts and her attitude despite how sick she has felt.

We're looking forward to camping this weekend, and hopefully we will both be somewhat recovered by then!

Summer 2008 Unveiled

We are finally settled in again here in Provo. Our recent neglect of the blog is due to several things, but needless to say we are happy to be home again. That being said, we had a wonderful summer and wanted to fill everyone in on some of our highlights.



This video contains pictures from many of our summer activities. We arrived in Athens, Georgia near the end of May. Most of our time there was spent studying, but we had the opportunity to go on a few trips. Then, at the completion of the internship, we began a road trip home that took us through South and North Carlolina, Cincinatti, Kansas City, and Colorado Springs. We saw some sites and visited family and friends along the way, and it was a blast.

With school and Stephanie's second trimester approaching, we are nevertheless "funned out" and happy to be back in our own home.

We love you all and hope you are doing well!

The Beginning of the End of our Summer

It feels like just a few days ago that we arrived to Athens, Georgia for my summer internship at UGA. Now we're done, and we're at the beginning of our journey home which will involve seeing new sites and visiting family. I often spend a lot of my time planning the future, but it's days like these that remind me I need to spend more time living in the present.

My internship was a great opportunity, and I learned so much. It was a lot of hard work, but I was able to accomplish some good work. In academics, your skills or your personality don't really matter unless someone with an important opinion takes notice and can verify those things. I was very lucky this summer to interact with people whose opinions matter. Not only will they be some of the people who write letters of recommendation for my future graduate school applications, they may also be the people to whom I send those applications!

We are also very lucky that Stephanie was able to be with me all through this summer. It would have been very difficult had she not been able to come. Stephanie was able to take classes through independent study, and the amount of progress she made will help her finish school despite being busy with the arrival of our first child next year. I have appreciated her hard work this summer, and the love and support she constantly provides.

Stephanie has had some tough days this week, and we've really started to see how bad morning sickness can get. Some days she wasn't able to keep anything down, and some days she has to lay down to avoid vomiting. We are really glad for the times when she is able to move about and be on her feet. This is definitely going to have implications for our summer vacation, but we're going to have a good time regardless of what we do!

We hope everyone is doing well. We love to hear from you. Take care!!!

Update

Let's see... we are:

• one week closer to coming home
• one week closer to Stephanie being done with morning sickness (by the way, any more suggestions or remedies?)
  
• one week closer to the BEACH!!!
• one week closer to our most excellent cross-country road trip
  
• one week closer to leaving dorm life!!!
• one week closer to having our first baby
• one week closer to our own bed!
• one week closer to our own kitchen (with a full-sized FRIDGE!)
• one week closer to seeing Stephanie's family in Colorado
• one week closer to seeing Daniel's family in Utah
• one week closer to our next blog post...keep in touch!

We love you!

Road Trip!!!

Ok, so we've still got two weeks left here in Athens...and we're having a good time. But we're really excited for our road trip home. We made campsite reservations a few weeks ago for Edisto beach, and yesterday we made hotel reservations for Charleston, SC and Durham, NC. Duke University in Durham is one of the schools I am interested in attending for graduate school, and so I have arranged to meet with a few professors there while we are still on this side of the country. Hopefully those contacts will prove helpful when it comes time to submit my application! Either way, Stephanie are both excited about our road trip home.

Oh, by the way, don't let Stephanie fool you. She may feel like the Wicked Witch, but she's been doing very well despite her morning sickness (or "all-day-except-1-to-3-pm" sickness). She's had trouble keeping food down at times, but she's remained cheerful and positive for the most part. I sure chose a wonderful wife to marry!

We love hearing from everyone. We hope you all have a wonderful week!

We have some wonderful news!

So, I've been feeling a little like the wicked witch of the west lately. Poor Daniel has been so patient and loving. I didn't exactly know why I was acting the way that I was, I just thought that even though I was late, I was still having PMS although a little worse than usual. Well, it turns out that it wasn't PMS after all. Instead of being late for the twenty-eight day cycle, it turned out that I was perfectly on time for the nine-month cycle. You guessed it: We are FINALLY pregnant! After a long 11 months we were starting to get a little worried about things, but I guess we are all right after all. The baby will be due March 1st or 2nd, right smack in the middle of the winter semester. We are super excited to have the opportunity to be parents soon!

We love you all and hope that you are continuing to have a wonderful summer!

24 Hours in Atlanta

Stephanie and I have been planning a trip to Atlanta for a while, and we finally had our chance this weekend. I went in to work early yesterday so that I could leave by 3:00 pm. We drove to the Atlanta temple (before the traffic got too bad) and spent some time there. Afterward, we drove up to Woodstock to spend the night with Sister Brush, an elderly lady that used to go to church with us in Augusta. She treated us to a nice dinner out, and we had a great time catching up before going to bed. She's getting older and slower, but she is not losing her energy nor her optimism.

After a wonderful breakfast and goodbyes, Stephanie and I drove to downtown Atlanta. We started with a 9:00 am tour at the World of Coca-Cola. There were fun exhibits that talked a lot about the history of Coke, advertising, production and distribution, and its global impact on culture. Best of all, the final exhibit had kiosks with Coke products from different regions of the world, and we tried just about all of them. Stephanie really enjoyed the drinks from Latin America, and I was very impressed with a melon flavored soda from Israel. Since we were the first tour, we were able to be out before the huge crowds were there.



After enjoying some buffalo wings for lunch, we headed next door to the Georgia Aquarium, the largest aquarium in the world. The crowds were starting to get pretty big by that point, but it wasn't too bad. We were impressed with the Ocean Voyager exhibit, which had a long walk-through tunnel, various windows and portholes, and a theater-like view into the tank containing 4 whale sharks, in addition to tons of other fish, sharks, rays, and sea creatures.


Overall, we had a blast! It was nice to take a break from our normal routine, and we got to see some pretty amazing stuff. We hope you enjoyed pictures. We love you all and can't wait to see you again!

Back in Business

Well, Stephanie and I are back in business. Our car had been in the shop for three weeks, during which time we almost brought it home twice. However, there was a gasket leak here or a computer problem there that kept it in the shop for three weeks. It runs great now though, and the best news is that we didn't have to take the bus shopping yesterday. Woo hoo!!!

In other news, I had my birthday on Monday, and Stephanie made sure it was a wonderful day (for more information, check out the previous post). The rest of the week was pretty typical of our long days at school/work, with long walks and reading books together in the evenings. We went out for dinner again on Friday and ate at a cute little Italian restaurant. We were very impressed with their tortellini and lasagna.

We're doing great here in Georgia, but we can't wait to see everyone in Colorado and Utah again. We love you!!!

Happy, Happy Birthday, Daniel Dear...

Yesterday* was Daniel's 23 birthday. We got to celebrate with ice cream, and brownies with mint frosting. It was a wonderful evening. Daniel really needed some new scriptures, so he got some. His guitar was in need of some nice strings, so the birthday fairy got some of those too. :)Here are some highlights of the evening...

After eating a big dinner of yummy enchilada's, Daniel anxiously awaits his presents.

Daniel shows off his presents. Look at how excited he is! :)

Daniel cuts the birthday cake(brownies with mint frosting). Our car was still in the shop at the time(we finally got it back last night), so I rode the bus to get ice cream. It was a little melted, but it still tasted really good.


We couldn't get this picture right...I am not even going to show the other ones...they are pretty bad. Hey, at least we were having fun!

We hope that every one is enjoying their summer! Love you all!

*His birthday was yesterday when I first wrote this...my connection was not very good, so it I didn't get to post it.

A Whole YEAR!!!

We have now officially been together a whole year. Well, sort of...We got engaged exactly a year ago today! At this time last year Daniel was working full time, I was going to school, we were planning a marriage, and totally wild and crazy about each other. We aren't planning a marriage, but other than that, nothing has really changed. Except now, we are not only wild and crazy about each other, we are totally, completely, and eternally in love. We can be very wild and crazy though. :) This past year has been wonderful. We have both grown so much and realized how much we really need each other.

These past couple of weeks have been crazy! Our car broke. We had to replace the transmission. We are just really glad that we followed the prophet's advice and saved for a rainy day. I still have not been able to get a job, so unless something amazing happens over the weekend, I am just going to continue doing school. I have found at least three more classes that I could take through independent study if I need to. I am already planning to do four classes and am almost done with three of them, so I may just be able to get them all done.

Daniel's internship is going well, he seems to really enjoy working with his group and he talks about new things everyday. I don't really understand everything, but I know they were just working on RNA extraction. Apparently, it is very tedious, and you have to do everything just right, or you have to start over again because it didn't work. Daniel is also getting excited about his research opportunity in Bioinformatics with Dr. Xu, and Dr. Dam. He will be working on a Bio-fuel project. He has been doing lots of research on it. It sounds very interesting, and I think he will enjoy it.

We miss everybody and we hope that you are all enjoying your summer. We are!!

Mi Casa es...Casa Mia

Stephanie and I just got back from a wonderful dining experience. With limited storage and cooking space here on campus, Stephanie and I take Friday nights as an opportunity to leave our dorm and eat out.

Tonight's venue was a little place called Casa Mia. We guessed from the name that it was a Mexican restaurant, but the food was actually inspired by Latin American countries further south. The food was very tasty, not quite as spicy as Mexican food, but rather a refreshing blend of natural flavors from the meat and vegetables. Stephanie ordered the night's house special, a plate of chicken nachos, with authentic tortilla chips and a great vegetable topping. I ordered a lomo saltado, which was small steak strips sauteed with onions and tomatoes, served over french-fry style potatoes, with a nice cream sauce on top. In addition to the great food, it was a nice, clean, simple, yet elegant atmosphere. The entrees were really affordable too, which made our visit all the more worth it.

Athens, Georgia has a lot of unique restaurants, and we look forward to trying out some new things while we're here!

We're In Georgia!!!

We're finally settling in here in Athens, Georgia. These past several days have been pretty intense. We left Provo early last Thursday morning, and spent the afternoon and evening with Stephanie's family in Colorado Springs. Friday we had a pretty uneventful trip to Columbia, Missouri where we camped for the night. Saturday we traveled to Augusta and spent the night with the Wilsons, some old friends. We had a wonderful day at church on Sunday and we got to see many old friends.

Come Monday morning, we packed up again and drove up to the University of Georgia in Athens. We arrived a few hours before my internship's check-in started, but our dorm room was ready for us to move in, so we started unpacking and re-arranging everything to make it as homey as possible.



Since then, Stephanie and I have been pretty busy. I've been spending all day at the Life Sciences building, and when Stephanie has a break from hunting for jobs, she's been studying back at the dorm. We have, however, been able to find time to spend together in the evenings, and we've enjoyed getting to know the campus in the warm, rich Georgia evening air.

Well, sorry it took us so long to post this. We love you all and hope everything is going well!

Today the family that I home teach spoke in sacrament meeting, so they asked Stephanie and I to watch their two children, Andrew (3 -4) and Emily (1-2). They actually weren't too bad, although Emily required a pretty consistent stream of Froot Loops to keep quiet.
Halfway through sacrament meeting, Emily saw momma and dada on the stand, and she started pointing at them and saying their names. It was really cute.

We're really lucky to have the chance to visit my mom and dad today. My grandma is visiting from Arizona, so this should be a very special Mother's Day.

We're leaving for Georgia on Thursday and we can't wait!

Key Lime Pie

We are leaving for Georgia in a week and a half, so Stephanie is working hard to finish her cooking class before we head out. Today's assignment...key lime pie. Yesterday as we were shopping I learned that key limes are smaller than normal limes and have a slightly different flavor, made popular by the pie we are making today! This is actually practice for a demonstration assignment--we are having Grandma James and Jenny over tomorrow night and for our FHE Stephanie will be showing off her skills! We're excited.

This morning we had the chance to go to Lehi to witness the blessing of one of Stephanie's cousins. Baby Railey is way cute, and we were glad that we were able to be there. We are enjoyed mingling with a lot of family afterwards.

We love you all and hope you have a great week!

Semester's over!

Well, we successfully finished another semester. We are soooo happy to be done for the summer. We thought we might get a little of a break, but as it turns out, the day exams were over, we started working full time. I am also taking an independent study cooking class and I'm trying to get it done before we leave for Georgia...that has been an adventure! Daniel has been super helpful at making sure I have time to do school after we get home from work (I think he just wants some gourmet food).

We were able to spend time last night celebrating the end of the semester with the Standage family. It was fun to just get away for a little bit and enjoy them. We especially enjoyed our little nieces and nephew. They are all growing up so fast! We wish that we could spend more time with them--watching them grow up, seeing the cute little things they do, and feeling their sweet spirits. We look forward to the day when we can enjoy kids of our own.

We are looking forward to our trip to Georgia. Only two and a half weeks and we will be out of here!!! Woohoo!! We still have not got anyone to sublease our apartment from us, but we have someone who is interested. I guess that has been the story of our life since we started advertising in March. We could really use some extra prayers! We love you all!

Walking on Air!

Despite Spring's apparent lack of motivation, we can't wait for it to arrive here in Utah. We went to the mall tonight and found a good deal on some Airwalk sandals. We'll sure be ready when Spring comes!!!

The End Draws Near

We are nearly at the end of our semester. We're excited for school to be done, and we're even more excited to go to Georgia for the summer.

Anyway, here are some recent photos.

We enjoyed coloring some Easter eggs. Note the nifty plastic cups that came with the kit.


Stephanie insisted that I put this picture up.


A picture of us in downtown Salt Lake City.


Fun in the snow.


We hope you are all doing well, and hope to hear from you soon!

iPost

This is our maiden post from our brand new shiny MacBook!!!

With the two of us going to Georgia this summer for a research internship, Stephanie will be doing some courses through BYU's independent study program. Even now during the semester, it would be nice to have a computer of our own, but during the summer is will be a necessity. The fact that we got a pretty fat tax return this March didn't hurt, either!

A day or two after we made the initial purchase, I received a phone call from Zion's Bank regarding "some recent account activity."  A bit nervous, I returned their call to see what the problem was.  They informed me that a hold had been placed on our account due to some abnormal activity with Apple Computers.  Relieved, I confirmed the validity of the purchases and they rescinded the hold on our account.  Hey, at least Zion's Bank hasn't forgotten who keeps them in business!

St. Patrick's Day

St. Patrick's Day has been the highlight of our busy week. We decided to have all green food for supper. I made sure we got our veggies, protein, dairy, fruit, and starch. For our vegetable we had broccoli, for fruit we had green melon Jello with bananas in it. Our starch was mashed potatoes gone green. The best part of our meal was the protein and dairy--GREEN EGGS AND HAM (with cheese on top)! It was fun to cook, and it was fun to eat. It was definitely a good distraction from our normal routine.

As far as the rest of the week is concerned, we were pretty busy with exams. We've been looking forward to this weekend. Not only will we be celebrating Easter, but we will be with family witnessing the blessing of our newest nephew, Jacob Benjamin Poulsen. To see pictures, check out Juli and Ben's blog!

Who Let the Dawgs Out?

It's been a while since we have written. We've just come to the conclusion that "we're busy" is not only an excuse, but will probably be our way of life for as long as we're in college!

There have been some exciting developments recently. The most exciting news is that we will be going to the University of Georgia for the summer. I was accepted for a 3-month research internship in genomics and computational biology. Not only is this going to be great experience for my educational and career prospects, but Stephanie and I are ecstatic to go back east.

The internship contract provided on-campus housing for me, but they agreed to give us our own room so that Stephanie could come along. She will be taking classes through Independent Study and working while we are there. However, Athens is only 90 minutes away from Augusta, so we will definitely be making a few visits to our old stomping grounds.

Wednesday night we managed to attend the annual BYU Honors symposium. There were great breakout sessions, nice food, and wonderful keynote addresses. Elder Bruce D. Porter of the Seventy and his wife (both BYU Honors graduates) spoke, and there was a wonderful spirit there, both a spirit of intellect and faith. Opportunities like this make a BYU education unique.

Last weekend I had the chance to go down to the Mojave desert with my genetics lab class. We spent Friday night on a ranch, and then spent a few hours Saturday collecting plant samples to bring back to the lab and analyze. On the way home, we stopped at the Mountain Meadows Massacre memorial for lunch. Overall, it was a wonderful trip.

We're busy, but we're having a great time in school. We love you all, and we hope you have a great week!