Au Revoir Soeur Evans

Today I spent the day with my little sister McKay and my mom, just before she enters the Missionary Training Center (MTC) tomorrow. She will be serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Port Vila Vanuatu Mission--New Caledonia Region, speaking French, for the next 18 Months.

We are so excited for her, but of course are going to miss her immensely. This is my first family member serving a mission, so I'm a newbie at this, even though I actually talk to missionaries every day for work. Any suggestions from you more experienced out there? I couldn't be more proud of my little sister for making this decision, and for her faithfulness, her spirit and her diligence. She is a truly amazing young woman. 

I had the chance to go to the temple with her today! What a cool experience. Words don't really describe the temple. I am so grateful to be able to go to them so frequently--it's a blessing about living in Utah that we have so many nearby. I'll try not to take that for granted.

We shopped around and tonight went to dinner. We missed our Dad a lot, and wish he could have been there too. Since McKay already speaks French pretty well, her date to report was changed, and Dad's big meeting at work was well, the same day as her report date.

This is probably my favorite Thai place in Provo/Orem. The lemongrass soup (Tom Kai Ka?) is the BEST! 

From dinner in Maryland at Christmas. 

After dinner, we celebrated Mum's birthday! Yay January 28 :) a major celebration--we had shortbread chocolate pudding pie ( I woke up at 6 am this morning to make it. I guess I do love them after all ;).

And then proceeded the after-dinner laughter and rumble-glomming on the sofa as per usual. We also enjoyed a fashion show by Jared, tales of how mom can sell ANYTHING and Haley ALMOST....crossing the line. And of course lots of pictures. Most of which I would be lynched for publicly displaying, so here are the best ones.

This was going to be a picture of just H and M, but J jumped in with that lamp at the perfect moment--this picture is purely candid.

Sweet sisters. 

M to H: "let's laugh at each other!" H to Me: "Why do you ALWAYS zoom in so much?!"

"Let's all look at McKay!"

Green Monsters

Have you ever been bitten by the green monster? You know the one I'm talking about. Not these guys:

I mean that green monster of jealousy that oozes into your blood stream and sets things simmering below the surface so that it festers like a wound.

Like when your co-worker gets three presents from clients and they all turn out to be chocolate.
Or when your friends move away.
Or when there's so many fun things to do at night and your husband has work at 3 am and has to go to bed at 8. Lame sauce.

In those cases our conversations go like this: "Hi honey I'm home! How was your day? What do you want for dinner? "
He replies: "......I'm going to bed in 1.5 hours."
Okay, so caffeine? So you can stay up and play with me?


Or other times, when your sisters have a birthday and you don't get anything! Which is so unfair right?

Or when your family members go out of town on a super cool vacation and leave you behind, even though you're a grown up and supposed to be above all that jealousy stuff.

Or when you get a text like this:

"Look who got to play with 7 puppies at clinical today."

Happy for you Hales, but I'm never going to admit it. Carry on.

Fresher than Fresh

Farmers markets are the best way to stay healthy. This is my strong opinion, not exactly fact. You get the freshest produce, as well as that which is in season, thus maintaining the balance of nature. You are also supporting your local farmers and small business owners. I like that.

We love shopping our farmers markets, and have two that we frequent regulary. A few weeks ago we bought 6 ears of corn for $1.20. They had clearly been picked that morning.

5 of the 6 ears of corn had caterpillars on them. Quel Surprise!

Don't worry, we ate chicken with it as our source of protein. I consider myself pretty granola and earthy. But not THIS much.