Easter!

I love Easter.  The Easter bunny definitely stopped by our place.  I woke up early to finish my lesson for Relief Society, so I did all my easter preparation while Landon was still in bed.  But when he was up, he made me go back and act like I was just waking up.  The Easter bunny left a note next to me as I "woke up" and literally hopped away, haha.  He told me "That was spontaneous...it just came to me." :)  I made Landon follow clues around the apartment to find all of his candy, and he had clues leading me to my basket in the place where he took me on a hunt last year while we were dating.  It was where he planned to have our first kiss, but it ended up happening later that day.  He said "Maybe I shouldn't bring you back here, it just reminds me of my failures." Cracks me up. We had to rush to make it to church!

Since we only have one car, we had to go shopping together and then avoid each other in the store so things could remain a surprise, ha.  We are nerds, but it's fun.  Landon even let me do a little shopping for some summer clothes.  He was supposed to be shopping for them too, but he just doesn't seem to like anything.  I never seem to have that problem...  We noticed that nothing for Easter has "Easter" in the name anymore.  Apparently it is too offensive to atheists, so they call eggs "Spring Spheres" and such.  RIDICULOUS! Landon and I both think that since it's a Christian holiday, we should be able to call it whatever we want.  If atheists are offended, then why are they celebrating our Christian holiday anyway?

Fun while shopping

The family that Landon home teaches brought us some awesome cupcakes

Church was great.  I did a lesson, so I had lots of time in preparing to think about the resurrection.  I found some great Mormon Messages videos, if anyone wants to watch them they are called "Sunday Will Come" and "An Apostle's Easter Thoughts on Christ" or something like that.  Later on Sunday we had a big dinner with Grandma Christensen.  Afterwards, since Steven Hawkins graduated, the whole Hawkins clan was around for a Rowley get together.  It was fun to see everyone again!  And we finished off the day coloring some eggs.  It was a great holiday.

Britney's eggs

Landon's eggs

Uh Oh

Yesterday, I was eating a muffin and driving to work when I got a phone call.  After talking, I turned to put my phone on the chair, but it slipped and I dropped it just as I was over my large cup of milk.  Apparently phones don't do so well with milk.  To make things so much better, it was not just my own phone, it was my work phone.  So I had to tell my boss that I ruined my phone, and of course he wanted to know how.  Now I will be going to Salt Lake to get it fixed or get a new one.  But, I can't really complain.  I got a new one in minutes, and they don't want me to pay for the iPhone that I ruined.

Soccer Practice

Landon took some pictures at practice as we were setting up a game.  

I was trying to decide how many people on each team, hence the weird face.  That is Brittany and Avery looking at the camera.

Close Calls

I almost died the other day!  Ok, maybe I wouldn't have died, but it was scary.  I was on the freeway, and I needed to get over so I could exit.  So, I speed up a bit and fit in between two cars quite nicely.  But all of a sudden, the car in front of me, which is the only one I could see because of the slight hill, SLAMS on his brakes...on the highway!  Yeah.  Since I had just sped up to get in that lane, not only was I and the large suburban behind me going pretty fast, but there wasn't loads of room between us.  I and the suburban try to hit the brakes too,  but it is very apparent that neither of us are going to stop in time.  The suburban is about to blast my behind, and I was surely going to hit the car in front of me before stopping.  My heart started racing!  I look to the shoulder to try and avoid, but of course with the eternal construction in Utah, there is no shoulder.  I look to the lane on my left and see the car that was beside me pass just in time for me to swerve out and pass the stopped cars.  The suburban swerved a little toward the shoulder and stopped just in time before smashing the car that had been in front of me.  I was almost smashed like a pancake. I think I spent the rest of my time on the way to work thanking God that we had avoided the accident!  Apparently some car had blasted a tire, and without a shoulder had stopped in the right lane, just over the hill.  Crazy!
It reminds me of my mission.  Texas roads are kinda crazy because they always have traffic, and a lot of trash on the highway.  One day, I was driving four other missionaries back from a service day in downtown Houston.  The traffic was horrendous--about bumper to bumper with cars on all sides.  It finally sped up to about 45 or 50 miles an hour, but it was still really close traffic and I was generally surrounded by cars.  All of a sudden I saw the two cars in front of me swerve like crazy.  I look to my side to see if there is any space, and blessing from heaven, for the first time in 45 minutes I didn't have a car on my side.  The car in front of me swerved to reveal a HUGE log going across my lane.  At the speed we were going, and with the traffic, I think I had about 3 seconds or less to react before we smashed into it, and probably would have flipped or crushed.  I swerved out of the way just in time and barely missed it.  Everyone in the car wasn't paying attention and got all upset that I drove so crazy, except one Elder who had seen everything and told them to be quiet because I just saved their lives, ha.  God was watching out for us.  Driving can be pretty crazy sometimes!  

Soccer!

I have entered the new exciting world of coaching a recreation league youth sports team.  Oh man, it's crazy.  My team is 10 and 11-year-old girls in soccer.  We have some lively ones.  Landon comes to be an assistant coach when his schedule permits, and he was excited to be a line judge for his first time ever.  The girls think he's great.  They call him all sorts of things, including "Landy" and "Mr. Sir".  They crack me up.  We have one girl that spends half of her time whining on the ground because it's not fair when someone scored while she was on defense.  Landon just pulls her to her feet and keeps playing.  I do a trivia question each practice about obscure rules of the game, so they can learn all the nuances of soccer.  I give mini candy bars to those that find out the answer.  Hannah spent about 3 minutes giving me a very practiced pouting lower lip and teary eyes, trying to get me to crack and give her a candy bar just because.  I must say, she is pretty skilled at that face!  Other girls are still afraid of the ball and scream whenever it comes above the waist.  Our practice on trapping was really exciting because of it.

My team told me that they have only won one game in the past two seasons.  I was really excited to get to work with them and help them improve, but I was a little disappointed when I found out how the program is set up here.  When I grew up, we had two practices a week that were probably about two hours each, and then one game each weekend.  Here, they seem to want to get through the season quick, so they have two games each week, and one practice, which they tell you must be only an hour--for the parents' convenience.  It makes me kinda sad.  These girls never get time to practice and improve, and then they spend all their time in games, where most people revert to instincts instead of anything they practiced.  Especially when they can't practice long enough for anything to become a habit.    So, we may not improve their win-loss record, but hopefully I can teach them something, and we can all have some fun doing it.  I haven't had a chance to take pictures, but I will post them in the future when I take them.

It reminds me a lot of when I was a kid.  I really have to say, I have great parents.  I remember when my Mom took the time to paint a cute banner for our team name that we put up on the sidelines.  She also helped in bringing treats.  If anyone has ever been around kids' soccer, you know that we all look forward to the oranges at half time and the treats after the game.  My parents used to drive me all over Washington for my games, and my mom would braid my hair in the car so I could match the other girls, and she made sure my uniform was all washed for the game.  Two uniforms actually, because we never knew what color we were going to wear at tournaments.  My parents would shield me so I could change on the field, ha.  And my Dad was always there yelling on the sidelines.  I see the parents freezing at our games in Provo, and I think of when my parents driving all the way to Olympia just to stand in the rain while we slid around on the field.  And they did all this for all five of the kids in my family.  Parents make all the difference, I have decided.  But, I also remember thinking my coach was the coolest guy ever, and I learned a lot about soccer from him.  Practices were always busy and fun.  I really just loved to play.  I just hope I can help these girls have a similar experience!