Christmas in 2007

Ashton and I had a great Christmas break. We spent a week down in AZ with my family. It was so nice and warm every single day. I had a great time making some pillows and curtains for my family. And spending lots of quality time with my friends.

Then we headed back up to UT to be with Ashton's family for Christmas day. We had such a great time eating Christmas Eve chili, cookies that the grandkids made, and just spending some good time with our family. All 8 kids with their spouses (if they are married) and their children (if they have them) were there. It was definitely a full house. Each day was filled with fun and laughter and each night was sat around and played lots of games. Jordan just got hotels (an old game from the 80's) which seemed to be a big hit among the Buswell siblings.



Although Christmas Eve was stormy and snowy, Christmas Day was unbelievably beautiful! We woke up to clear skies with the whole earth covered in white.



It was the perfect day for some sledding. I do not ever remember going sledding in my whole entire life, so I count this as my first time. And what a beautiful time it was! Although I did go off this one jump and rolled on my head, it was still loads of fun.

We got some good gifts. Our favorite was by far some good additions to our food storage and getting Christmas cards from our friends who we don't get to see, and even those that we do get to see.

After Christmas we had a wonderful experience in the Ogden temple with Ashton's family. His grandpa is a sealer there and every endowed person was there to do sealings as his grandpa was the sealer. It was beautiful.

We spent some good time playing with all of our cute nieces and one nephew (we have one more on the way due in Jan!)

I was working on some research when Tess and Jaycie came in. I pulled up the paint program on the computer and they each took turns coloring. It was so dang cute. Not too long after, Addi and Landon came in to join the fun. We had such a great time coloring and jumping all over the bed!

Here's the lovely Pollack-esque cousin picture we drew together.


The little girls love to get visited by the tickle monster!

Me and Tess and Addi just playing around.

Ashton's phone was plugged in on the floor next to his razor. We took the phone away hoping to keep it from getting ruined. So the razor was the next best thing to call grandma!

We ended our stay up north by doing a simulated surf and then sky dive. It was pretty intense. We had a great time with both families and feel privileged that we were able to spend so much great time with everyone. We hope everybody's Christmas was as wonderful as ours was.

7 Things You Might Not Know About Me

This is for Tanya who put me up to the challenge.

1. I love french fries. More than Chocolate, I love french fries. In the book 1984 they have chocolate rations which seem to get smaller week by week. I would be able to live with that. In fact, I could be happy with no chocolate the rest of my life. But french fries? And I know that it is probably the worst food that one could possibly love, but I just can't help it. And I am grateful that I don't ever crave french fries, but when I go out to eat, I love to get something with fries just because I love them.

2. I have a life goal to write a book. Many people have mentioned that I should write a book someday. I don't think it is such a bad idea myself. There are a few things in life I think everyone should do. One is write a poem and enter it into a contest--which I am proud to say that I have done. One life goal down. One of my next is to write a book. As you can see from this lovely image, my book is still blank.

3. I have dreams of living in Italy above a bakery when I'm old. I would love to wake up to the smell of fresh bread everyday. And I think Italy just seems so rustic and romantic. I don't expect that this dream will ever become reality, but one can always dream.


4. I live in a bubble, like bubble boy. I have never been stung by a bee. I have never had a cavity. I have never broken a bone. I have never sprained anything. Knock on wood. I once told one of my good friends this and his reply was, "You need to get out more". I get out plenty, in my opinion, but I just live in a bubble.



5. I am obsessed with weather.com. I check the weather at least once a day. I don't know why I check the weather so much. I just feel like it makes me feel like I know what is going on in the world I guess. I even check the weather for places where I am not--like where my family is. It's nice to know what their day is like!



6. I have never had my wisdom teeth out. I only have 2 wisdom teeth on the bottom and the dentist said that if they don't ever come in don't bother taking them out. So I still have them.

7. I think everyone but me is a crazy driver. Just kidding. One of my pet peeves is when people speed up and then cut you off and then go slower. What kind of crap is that? Like on the way down to AZ, I put my car on cruise control and I passed this car and then Wyoming (I give other cars on the road names sometimes) passed me and then I passed her. This happened 4 times before she finally sped up for good. But honestly, I was going the same speed the whole time. She was the one who couldn't make up her mind about how fast to go. It drove me crazy! So there, I guess I am the crazy one--driven by other people's poor driving.

Internet Dr.

Some people talk of TV doctors. Are they accurate? Do they really use terms that doctors use? Some people ask if they are hot enough to be a TV doctor--actually I don't really know, that is just my perception of TV doctors. But what about internet doctors?

So last week I was rather sick with some sort of stomach bug. I am not exactly sure what it was, but the information that I needed could easily be found by typing some symptoms into the world's convenient search engine of Google. Ashton brought up that many people that he had talked to recently have diagnosed themselves over the internet and found viable help with their issues. We both found this rather amusing. Ashton keeps making fun of me about my internet dr. But honestly, what is the point of going to the doctor when you can figure it out yourself? Although, I do think that there are some cases that you should really go see a doctor, especially if the internet doctor tells you to or if symptoms don't clear within a few days. But I'm sure that more people than I actually think, use the internet as a source of cure for those annoying seasonal ailments. And you should be wise about the sources you gather info from, but I found my internet doctor rather accurate and helpful. I just might be using him again in the future. It's a lot cheaper than co-pay!

Beautiful Winter

There have been many mornings this month when we have woken up to the earth covered in beautiful snow! It is so lovely. I have now admitted to some that I do love the winter time. I never thought I could say that, but it really is beautiful. Although I like the winter, I can only handle it for about 2 months or so. After Valentine's day I am ready for spring.

And what a better time to snow! Christmas is coming and that song about a white Christmas is always on the radio and it will be white this year. Plus, we needed some good snow so we could go snowboarding before we leave the country to summertime!

One of my favorite things is when the sun makes the snow all shiny. What a beautiful world we live in. I believe that the winter is just one of God's many signs of the giving of His son. As the earth is covered in glorious white so can we be as our Savior is, covered in white, being whole and pure and clean before Him.

I just wanted to take a minute and express how much I love my sweet husband--considering he is one of the only ones that really look at our blog. My birthday was just last week and he took me out to this nice restaurant here in Orem and just spent some good quality time with me. It meant a lot to me! I love you Ashton!

Moving to New Zealand

Ashton got back from New Zealand just a few days before Thanksgiving. Before he got back he proposed the idea of moving to New Zealand. I was quite ambivalent about the whole situation. I have a lot of good things going on here. I have work and was going to apply to work with some professors on a summer camp program and do some more research with that. I have the research that I am currently doing. I thought that maybe I could look for a graduate program in NZ that I could attend, but couldn't find one that I wanted to join. So I suggested that maybe we just leave in Jan and be there for 4 months.

We prayed about it and the answer came to me through the song "I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go." Ashton and I have been thinking about buying a house for about a year now and all of the houses we looked at just never felt right. I have prayed since we decided that we wanted to buy a house that I would find a place where we could live where we could be of most service to the Lord. After praying, I truly feel that New Zealand is where we need to be, even for this short time. It will be an amazing experience as we follow the Lord in faith.

Ashton will be working for this marketing company. And I will hopefully be working with Ian Ferguson, a five time olympic kayaking champion. He now owns a kayaking business where I hope to be employed. We also hope to do a little traveling to Aussie!

We know that this is quite a random things in our lives, but we are excited for the many opportunities that lie ahead. We will be back in May. Before Ashton left for NZ he signed up to work with another summer door to door company. So we will be back for that. And then in the fall I hope to start graduate school (for real) in the fall!

We are excited to go back to the beautiful country of NZ after having been there over last Christmas break. More than seeing the beautiful country we are excited to see the beautiful people. The people of NZ really make that country amazing. They are the most warm, loving, generous people as a whole that I have ever met. We hope to be more like them as we spend time with them.

Here we are in NZ at Whangarei Falls last Christmas Break

We also went to Muriwai Beach and many other beautiful places