Happy Chinese New Year!

Gerrit and I had a great family home evening last night as we celebrated the Chinese new year with lots of friends and lanterns! A friend in our ward is from China and she invited several of us out last night to send up lanterns to celebrate the holiday. We each got a paper lantern and we wrote on it our wish for the new year. Then we lit the candle underneath, let the lantern fill with hot air, and sent it off--just like in Tangled! :) It was snowing/raining quite a bit so I was nervous that the lanterns wouldn't fly, but they did and it actually looked pretty cool with the snow. The wetness also protected against some potential problems, like when lit lanterns accidentally maneuvered their way into the trees. We had a great time learning a new tradition; and here's hoping our lantern wishes come true this year!

 

Something New

Anyone who knows me at all knows that I do not like to exercise. I never have. I've never really liked being dirty or sweaty or in pain, and I've never been good enough at a sport to work past those things. I've tried just about every sport out there; I think that my extremely athletic father was hoping that something would stick, but I was never good at (and never really liked) anything I tried: softball, soccer, basketball, volleyball, ice skating, field hockey, dance, swimming. Really, I tried it all. Despite how it sounds though, I do actually like to do things and to be out and active, but not in an organized sport or exercising time kind of way. What I actually love to do is walk.

That might sound funny, but I really do love it. I love to be outside on beautiful days and I love to explore places. One of my favorite things about living in Barcelona was how walkable the city was; I walked everywhere, and I loved it. I did the same thing while on study abroad in London. I explored both of those cities by walking through their streets and alleys, parks, festivals, and shops. I found that it feels good to walk--and that it doesn't feel like exercise.

After Gerrit ran the Top of Utah Marathon in September, lots of people asked if I was going to run one too. I can't imagine anything worse sounding than running 26 miles. But the more I've thought about it, walking 13 miles doesn't seem so bad, especially if it's in the summer, and especially if it's with friends. So, even though I am about as far from athletic as you can be, I am going to walk a half marathon. I figure if I write it on my blog and other people read this I'll have to actually commit. I'm in the process of finding one around here in Utah that a) still has available spaces and b) is a date that we're in town, but I'm going to do it! And I would love some company for both the training and the actual marathon if any of my lovely girlfriends would like to join me. If not, Gerrit will do it with me--he can run the first half of the marathon and meet me at the half way point to walk the rest. :)

It does feel good to try something new--and for me, "exercise" is definitely new!

Christmas Break

We had a great time in Denver with Gerrit's family over our two-and-a-half week break from BYU. We had a lovely Christmas and a fun New Year, and we got to spend time with lots of family. We were in Denver the whole time along with Gerrit's parents and three of his siblings, Mark, Rachelle, and Natalie. We also got to see Laura, Jordan and their darling girls, and Jason, Andrea and their cute kids for a few days. We did miss Luke, Gerrit's little brother who is serving his mission in Brazil, but it was fun to be able to see all the other siblings! I missed being with my family for the holidays, though they seemed to have a blast in warm Peru, spending a week in the Amazon hanging with monkeys, shooting blow darts, and fishing piranhas! I can't wait to see them in April when they come to Utah for General Conference.

We definitely enjoyed relaxing and not having to worry about school for a few weeks; I forgot how much I like to sleep in! Gerrit loved all the snow; we certainly had a white Christmas! We went to see lots of movies: Sherlock Holmes 2, Mission Impossible 4, and War Horse were all great. One of my favorite things that we did was go to the Denver Zoo to see the "Zoo Lights." It was really fun, and my hand and feet warmers tucked into my gloves and boots helped keep me warm in the freezing weather!

Rachelle, Natalie, me, Gerrit, Mark

 

 

We had a really nice time at the beautiful Denver temple!

Merry Christmas!

Gerrit's dad loves photography, and he was nice enough to take some pictures for us; Gerrit was nice enough to not complain as I made him sit for pictures :)

My cute niece Brynlee, who gave me one of the best laughs of the break: I was about to read her a story and she climbed up into my lap, patted my stomach and said "hi baby!" I asked her what she was doing and she smiled at me and said, "you have a baby in your tummy!" I'm actually not pregnant (though three of her other aunts are), but it definitely made me want to double check!

I'm so lucky to have such a handsome husband!

We hope all our friends and family had a wonderful holiday season!