Pretend for a minute that they never broke up.

Our wonderful new ward hosted its annual Trunk or Treat this week. With all our things in storage and two day's warning, we opted to work with what we had--blonde hair, a few basics, and the local Wal-mart and Ross.

Enter: Preppy Barbie and Ken!

We were, of course, operating on the assumption that our 6-year-old friends are still unaware of the big breakup.

We came prepared with the classic shoes...

heart-shaped candy holders filled with pink and purple candies...

and plenty of Barbie wrapping paper and hot pink accessories.

It was a great time and an excellent warm-up for the main event this weekend! As we speak, I'm headed to Utah (en route to Ohio) for some quality candy collecting with my munchkins. So, on that note,

Happy Halloween!

Hope your weekend is as entertaining as I know mine will be :-)

Eating cows and caramel

I was craving chick flicks and caramel apples last Friday, so to even the score a bit we kicked off our date with some delicious (read: manly) steaks.

Then we went to work, melting caramel...
dipping apples...
using every last drop...
and enjoying the results.
(And the movie.)

It was fun.

Bern, Switzerland: The Temple

This is such a welcoming sight, no matter where you are in the world:

Immediately after landing in Germany, we skipped lunch, picked up our rental car and began to make the 5-hour drive to the Bern Switzerland Temple.
We were supposed to make it with an hour to spare but got stuck in crazy rush hour traffic in the French countryside. Who would've thought?
By the time we finally made it to the Temple, we were fifteen minutes too late. We'd tried SO hard to make it and were a little disappointed at first, before realizing that visiting the Temple was still the perfect way to start our European honeymoon. The grounds were so beautiful and peaceful, and it was nice to be on the opposite side of the world and still feel at home.

(Plus, it was only Day 1 and we already had an excuse to go back!)

Saturday at the Rose Bowl

Matt's brother Spencer came to town on business just as we flew back into California (talk about good timing!). So, we met up in LA for a Saturday centered around football.

Because, well, we love football.

Our first stop was the Rose Bowl, where Oregon was taking on UCLA at noon.
We cheered for the Ducks and saw a few top-10 worthy plays, including the #2 play of the day right in our end zone. However, I must admit that after our awesome SEC experience, the Pac-10 was a little lacking! (Who knew?)
After the game, we fought traffic for a couple hours before finally making it from Pasadena to the ESPN Zone in Downtown Disney...
...where we got to watch BYU and Air Force play simultaneously, all while eating delicious burgers and an incredible dessert.
Ah, we love this place. And I think we made Spencer a believer, too.

Deception

Speaking of "Sweet Home Alabama," a friend and I thought it would be fun to visit some of the pretty film locations used in the movie while living in the aforementioned state...

...only to discover that "Sweet Home Alabama" was actually filmed in Georgia.

To put our feelings on the subject in plain terms, it's kind of like we're 6-years-old and just found out Santa really lives at the South Pole.

One last look at Montgomery

Before leaving Alabama, we spent one last afternoon sightseeing in historic Montgomery.

A few highlights:

The first White House of the Confederacy:
Alabama's capitol: Veteran's memorial at the capitol:
Court Square:
A fountain stands where the slave trade once did, with the capitol in the background. This square was also along the route of numerous marches in the Civil War and later, the Civil Rights movement.

The Greyhound Station where the Freedom Ride came to an end:
Beautiful homes in the Cloverdale area:
Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald's home:

And one last look at the city while driving away at 5:00 a.m.:
We had a wonderful time and made such great friends during our stay in Alabama. I don't think we'll ever think of the song "Sweet Home Alabama" the same way ever again!

In California... for now.

As of last week, Matt and I are back in California! We're staying with some incredibly kind friends (due to our current state of homelessness) until we leave for Ohio at the end of the month. Meanwhile, I'm doing my best to store up all the sunshine I can in hopes it will get me through a November in the bitter cold of the midwest.

And while I'm sure we're going to have a blast in Ohio, we are REALLY looking forward to coming back to California for good after Thanksgiving. I can hardly imagine what it'll be like to live out of dressers instead of suitcases.
Oh, the things we take for granted...

This is how we roll. I mean, fly.

After spending 3 days in the Dover Air Force Base terminal, we finally walked on board a brand new C-17 heading to Spangdahlem, Germany.

(No pictures are allowed on the flight line, so this stock photo will have to do.)

By the time our flight took off at 9 p.m., we were extremely tired
and oh-so-stinking-EXCITED to be on our way!
The cargo wasn't too shabby, either--a bunch of humvees.
May I just say that it was the most fantastic plane flight ever? We rolled out a sleeping bag underneath a humvee and slept for the entire 8.5-hour flight. Minus the time I got up to go to the bathroom and took this picture of Matt, of course:
Pretty cool, no?

And just when we thought it couldn't get any better, we woke up in Germany.

The terminal and a police car

Matt and I decided long ago that a good portion of his 60-day post-graduation leave would be spent on a European honeymoon. A major enabler to this plan was using the military's Space-A program to get over there. Basically, Space-A (also known as "hops") is like flying standby on a commercial airline... except you're flying standby on Air Force planes. And, oh yeah, it's FREE!

So, we used my frequent flier flights (say that three times fast), flew to Dover, Delaware, and began the long wait to catch a flight to Germany. Since we didn't have a car to explore off-base, we spent a lot of time in the terminal and at the commissary (grocery store), BX (convenience store) and playground.
Since we signed up early, we were at the top of the long standby list and should have been on a flight the first day. But after waiting all day, the flight was canceled due to mechanical problems. On the second day, we were supposed to be on the first flight to Germany (which was supposed to leave at 8 p.m.), but after waiting all day again and even busing out to the plane and sitting on the flight line for over an hour, the flight was canceled due to mechanical problems.

For the record, we were starting to feel like we were in the movie "The Terminal," which we ironically watched for the first time while spending hour #39 in the Dover terminal. Yet we were actually having a grand ol' time making friends, playing games, and saying "Hi, I'm in Delaware."
However, there was one little problem--after our flight was canceled, we called the hotel on base to book a room only to discover it was already full. It was 10:15 at night and we were stranded in Dover, Delaware. We didn't want to pay an obscene cab fare (save it for Europe, right?) so we hopped on the computer, found a hotel that Google said was only 3 miles away and just 1/2 mile outside a gate on the other end of the base, and started walking.
We faithfully followed our Google walking directions and got 2.5 miles down the road before coming to a dead end. At the same time, a police car pulled up next to us and asked where we were going... and then informed us that said gate had been closed for years. We were 2.5 miles in the wrong direction and it was now after 11:00 p.m. Luckily, the cop took pity on us and let us hop in the back seat of her car.

Remind me not to be a criminal. Also not to trust Google walking directions. The seat was plastic, the leg room was non-existent, and it was hotter than Hades back there. But, it was a ride (and great material for a future truth-or-lie game: back of a police car on our honeymoon) and we were grateful.

And the next day, well, it deserves a post all its own. Stay tuned :-)

Baby Tasha

If you were babysitting Tasha, you'd take a million pictures of her, too.

(Can you believe those gorgeous deep blue eyes?)



(Sometimes she'll curl up in a cute little ball like this...)
(But mostly she likes to stretch out those long Graf legs.)

Anyone else feeling a little baby hungry these days?