January 23

Ooooooooookay
So, update.

Life hasn't been thrillingly paced lately. In fact, we've hit a few bumps in the road lately. The biggest one to me being my shoes/transportation to work. I essentially spent an entire week not walking to work, and now this week I need to walk. So since it snowed on Saturday - I switched to my snow boots that we recently had fixed. Or so I thought.

The reason we'd gotten them fixed was because up at USU, instead of taking the bus, I had chosen to go at my own time table and not depend on the bus, so I chose to walk to school everyday, which took me about thirty minutes. No big deal. I liked the exercise, being outside and the decreased risk of being late. So I wore those boots out since I went to school in January and needed snow protection. Now, I love these boots. They are from IFA, and they are really cute, but the backs of them started wearing out to the point where there was some kind of plastic sharp bit coming up and out and poking me in the Achilles tendon. Ouch. So when we knew we'd be getting married and needed to get my boots back to working order, we went to a guy my boss recommended. He put leather patches on the back of them, and they felt better.

But not good enough to walk in for three miles. I went and tried to walk in them for the first time yesterday. They were not ready. I got about one mile? before they started digging into me. I thought I could make it- but then it started feeling like one had literally popped out and was cutting into me in every step. I finally gave up and called my mother, who came and got me and brought a box of bandages. That night, Atlantean helped me go get new shoes, which we don't know if they'll do, but hey, they're new. They look like a mix between hiking boots, tennis shoes and snowboots, so I'm hopeful.

So suffice to say, I'm not in a great mood today. I'm not mad, I'm just kind of perpetually tired and kind of wanting not to have to put forth effort to be kind or helpful (which is kind of my job...) I also haven't been sleeping well, I'm assuming due to the lack of I guess activity in my life, and then my aching ankles and legs, Atlantaen's snoring, and the new bed. I guess I'm also thinking a lot, maybe even overthinking and keeping myself up. So I'm just kinda tired...

Atlantean has now successfully completed three days at his new job! He comes home really dirty. And I worry about his next transition on whatever he finds about this job. Last night we had a "fend-for-yourself" dinner, but I realized I didn't like that. It's hard, but I wanna think about making dinner every night. So I guess pork chops or taco soup tonight.

I need to wake up earlier to clean my house. Being a homeowner (which we're not even ENTIRELY homeowners) is rough stuff.

Also, I read Twelve Angry Men yesterday at work and I was absolutely BLOWN away by how good that play is. I wanted to write essays on what I thought the motives were behind certain characters, and thoughts and reasoning and how they all worked and fit together. Apparently, the author Reginald Rose, based it on a real life jury experience. When I brought it up with Atlantean when he came to pick me up, I was absolutely astonished to hear that he had not only seen it, but it had truly resonated with him and he remembered so much! And we just gobbled about it all the way home about how good it was and how much we admired it and I was so shocked by how many specific occurrences in the play we both could remember - because it was that memorable and well-written! New favorite play/book. I LOVE TWELVE ANGRY MEN!!!

We also had a good Family Home Evening with Jinn and Troll. Troll said he appreciated my edits on his first chapter, which I really need to get around to doing the second chapter, because he really did seem to take it seriously, and I appreciate that. Jinn made chocolate marble cheesecake bars (uh, wow) and then for the lesson, we talked about the LDS church's stand on the law, and that the church tells it's members to abide by the laws of the land, insomuch that they do not contradict the laws of God. We talked about what that meant, and it was interesting. Also Jinn and Troll dutifully took note of the couple things that we mentioned were broken in our downstairs apartment, namely a lightbulb and the dishwasher's soap dispenser.

Last night Atlantean and I read six chapters of The Candymakers. He is such a patient man. I know he wanted to play his games, but he understood that we were behind for our family's book club. It got a little more interesting (you know how books can drag at first) but I want us to have a goal to finish it on time, especially since it's unrenewable at the library currently. Atlantean put a hold on another copy, and said there were no previous holds on it, so maybe we'll have more time.

Also! I bought my first two games ever I have owned! Badland for the computer! (wow!!!) and Armikrog, which I like to think is the heir to The Neverhood, which was a game we fondly played as kids. I'm kind of excited to dig into it sometime. I'm also currently working through the play Our Town (meaning - the DVD or film version, I already read the script) I can only manage to watch maybe twenty minutes of it every day, but it's cool to see a play that I read come to life.
Currently, I'm waiting kind of impatiently for the Bluffdale play schedule to come out just to know when to schedule around and so I can finally be involved in something. C'mon Bluffdale!!!

We went to Sylph's homecoming party on Friday night. Had to cancel D&D because of it, and it was the day that it started snowing all crazy-like. So we went and picked up Dryad, who wanted to come see Sylph too. It ended up being nice, but kind of awkward, (idle chit-chat is not that family's strong suit, or that friend group in general) so I volunteered my games and we played a couple rounds of Codenames and Mysterium, which I think actually were quite enjoyable :)
This Sunday was crazy! We had our own church - in which we talked to the bishop and he extended a calling to us! (we're in the nursery! Uh, wow!) and then we ran to Sylph's homecoming at her church, and got there JUST as she started to speak. Then we went home to settle down for just a little bit, and then I attempted to make an onion dip just before we ran out to Mermaid's "not" boyfriend's ordaination! Which was a big deal! Mermaid's "not" boyfriend (name... name... ) Vampire was actually not planning on going on a mission, but has decided to, and we are super excited for him! Vampire also asked Atlantean to be in his circle, and Atlantean was honored! It was super cool to see him up there, all full of the spirit of God :) I have an awesome husband.
Afterward, we hung out with Vampire's family to have an amazing dinner which his amazing mother produced (I mean, seriously, how did I not notice how much work goes into these things now that I actually am a wife and a dinner-cooker)
Then, with my half baked onion dip, we headed to a birthday party at Atlantean's familys house - and we actually came up with some cool last-minute birthday gifts! Namely a gift card we had gotten from our wedding- and a top that I had thought was cute, but wasn't flattering to me, so I gave to the six year old as a  dress and it was actually quite cute! I asked Atlantean's mom if I could use her oven to finish my onion dip which I had been carrying around all day, but I finished it after everyone else was done eating... so... we took it home.
Then, my parents called us back over to their house to let us deliver "news" we had decided to drop hints about. When we got to their house, we sat down, held hands, and looked at each other nervously, and I just began with,
"We have some news....
That has to do with children...."
And my mom just stopped chewing. Just dead stopped. And my dad calmly asked "What about children?"
And I let the silence hang a long time in the air. And then just let it drop.
"We got a calling in the nursery."
We all got a laugh out of that, even if my parents were clutching their chests a little bit. Then my mom gave us a ton of good advice about what to do in the nursery, since she had served there for a good year and a half. It was honestly really helpful advice, and almost kind of amusing. Earlier, Atlantean had been worried that they would get mad at us, so he left the car unlocked just in case we "had to run for our lives."
THEN we had to head BACK to Atlantean's house to find some keys he had left there (they keys to our house...) and when we got there, his mom, his dad and Aos Si were discussing what to do about Atlantean's grandma who lives with them, and is now currently in the 6th stage of a 7 stage dementia. She lately gets overstimulated at parties and can get kind of snappy around babies and people when she gets that way. They're trying to decide how to have parties without overwhelming her. It's interesting, the different stages of life.

What else... what else... We did get the chance to play First Martians that Atlantean bought, and I'm sad to say it was a little anticlimactic. Now that may have been just because we were playing on a tutorial easy mode, and maybe it would get cooler and more interesting with an actual campaign, and I do wanna give it a try with Pixie's family someday, maybe on a harder setting, because Atlantean was kind of disappointed and I hate seeing him that way.
Also, my mom came to my house and we looked into more education opportunities for me. I'm not sure what I wanna do about education, since money is now such a valuable commodity. I think I need two semesters to think about it. Which BY THE WAY I AM SO EXCITED TO LARP THIS SUMMER (And put on my originally written musical play ;) )

Um... that's about it.....

Thanks for listening! I don't rant at all!
~Nymph