More Brother-liness (And the debut of Austin!)

Watching TV on Sunday! (It only happens every four years)

Chase
Ryan pummeling Austin
Brotherly love... ?
Brotherly abuse
Austin!
(Sorry for excluding him, but I barely saw him when I had my camera before)
Brotherly kicking
Daniel likes me to take pictures of HIM
The skillful pinching of the ear with the toes (and screaming in pain)

More of Daniel snorting :) Haha





Brotherly pillow fight




Well, I got a special treat today with the boys. Since tonight was the closing ceremonies of the Olympics and they don't normally ever watch TV on Sundays, their parents decided to allow it but only once every 4 years. lol. Boy, did we soak it up. It was great, but the best part was watching the men's indoor volleyball win the gold. I also stayed up late last night and watched men's basketball. It was the dirtiest game of basketball I've ever seen! (Ok, I don't watch that much basketball, but I do know that there are normally NOT foul shots every single minute) But they pulled it off in the end and left with the gold. By then Austin was asleep and me and Ry were practically holding out eyelids open. Gaaah! What a late game, but it was great!

Crash Course in Brothers

As you know, I've never had a brother. Well, this week I am getting the crash course in brothers dealing with the 5 Vanfleet boys. Ok, only 4 of them are really old enough to be a threat, and I don't see one of them enough for him to be a threat either, but they're still there. Christina keeps saying "Poor Alexa" because of the 'attacks' I endure, but I really like the new experience. It kinda helps that their all younger than me, too. lol. I can laugh at them and think they are cute, and not be annoyed at all. Today I got some great pictures and movies of them being silly. Enjoy....

Chase slicing the cat!

D eating dinner
Baby Wyatt with Ryan
Pouty-faced D
Baby Wyatt
D with a picture-prefect frown
Ryan being bored and teen-ager-y
Chase- the serious one. Seriuosly.
Silly Daniel!
Ryan waving "Hi" and holding Wyatt

Daniel's favorite thing to do is snort...

One-liners from Brad and John

Here's some good one-liners from Brad Wilcox and John Bytheway this week:

-Nobody wants to go to Disneyland and cheer up Mickey Mouse (missionaries should be happy like Mickey).

-Be a thermostat instead of a thermometer.

-Happiness is a city in the state of Mind.

-Answer to everything: Deseret Books.

-People eat corn. (give corny compliments)

-Putting on the breaks while mom and dad are pedaling is considered just plain rude.

-When Moses started out he was just a basketcase. He was in denile. He told the Pharaoh, "Your plan sphinx!"

-A clean room is a happy room. This room is depressed.

-When a Nephi leads, a Sam will follow. (Sam was older)

-A testimony of straw and sticks will not be enough when the Big Bad Wolf comes. You need bricks!

-The Salvation (gas) Station is strictly self-serve.

-To Brad Wilcox: "You are the weirdest man I have ever met!"

-Alma to the Zoramite poor: "You are good soil because you have been treated like dirt!"

Nephi and "Pride and Prejudice" Musicals

As part of Education Week, the Harris Fine Arts Center had a few performances going on.

Wednesday I saw the Musical Account of Nephi called With Mine Own Hand. I even had a front row seat! I didn't like the way they started it, so I thought it would all be weird, but it turned out I really liked it. Basically it was old Nephi telling us the story from the side of the stage where he was writing the plates. then it would cut away to action on the stage. Some parts were pretty funny. I didn't much like the actor they had for Nephi, but Laman and Lemuel were good... in a bad way. lol. My favorite scene was when the angel was showing Nephi Lehi's dream and more. They had Nephi and the angel standing on the mountain while dancers did and interpretive dance of the vision. It was sweet! There was also a cute scene of Nephi and his wife while he was tied up on the boat. She was singing to him with his head on her lap. I didn't necessarily think it was the most probable of scenes (like Laman and Lemuel would really let her to that) but it was still cute. My favotie song was one when Nephi was quoting his famous "I will go an do..." scripture, while Laman was quoting his murmuring, "It is a hard thing you have required...." scripture. They were speaking to Lehi and alternating lines from their part. Very neat!

Thursday I saw the Pride and Prejudice muscial. I was pretty excited about it becasue I love the story, and I was interested in how the musical would be. I had a top row seat and a great view! The character Mary came out and talked about "noise makers" (cell phones) and--something I can't get used to yet-- said a prayer before they started. They did that for Nephi, too. I like it, but it's weird me. I completely forgot I was surrounded by Mormons in Target because it felt so normal. lol. Anyway, The actors were really very good. They looked a lot like the characters from the Hollywood version with Kiera Knightly, but took more elements from the 6-hour version from BBC with *sign* Collin Firth. Some good acting that sticks out was Mr. Collins and Lydia. I mean they were so bad it was good. And when they would all break out into singing it was fun. But it was a little annoying that they would giggle after almost every song. Ugg. :) I especially liked Darcy's song called "As a Moth to the Flame" about being burned by love. The actors of Jane/Bingley and Elizabeth/Darcy were actually married. That's probably why their kisses weren't very staged. Haha. I loved it so much that I had a cheesey perma-grin for a while and I still smile when I think about it.

I heard school was cancled again for Orange County because of the "hurricane." Best of luck and love and miss you all!

UTAH!

Well I flew into Salt Lake around 3:30 Mountain Time on Monday, August 18th. My uncle picked me up from the airport with his wife and they drove me to Provo. I kept taking pictures of the mountains because they are so pretty. But the pictures don't really do them justice. I spent the rest of the day watching the Olympics with the family I am staying with right now, the Vanfleet. She was my mom's roommate at BYU and moved down to Oviedo years ago and we randomly met up with them in the church building. She taught me piano for a few years, then they moved to Provo so her husband could teach at BYU. So I am staying with them, and this week I am attending Education Week and it is really great! I'm learning my way around campus (as in, getting lost and having to find a way back) and I'm just getting more familiar with the area in general. I rode my bike to campus this morning and had a few classes today. I got to attend a Campus Devotional with Elder Robert D. Hales, and my favorite class today was a tag-team class taught by John Bytheway and Brad Wilcox! The best two youth speakers, together! It was the funniest thing ever. Their topics was "If you can laugh at it, you can live through it." It was all about humor. They just kept telling jokes and at one point Brad was laughing so hard at the long joke he was reading he could barely speak. I was really great. Then afterwards, like I'd hoped, we got to meet them and I got pictures with each of them and they signed my booklet. It was so cool to finally meet John Bytheway! I also met a nice girl my age, named Brianna, who's going to be a freshman this fall as well. We ended up talking for like 45 minutes. She was really nice and we exchanged e-mails and numbers. She's so sweet. That's about all the excitement I had today. Here's some pictures:

Mountains!

Provo
Provo Towne Center
BYU Football Stadium!
Me in Utah! Woo
Provo Temple with sun coming over mountains!
Campus Education Week crowds
Me and John Bytheway!
Brianna, Brad Wilcox, and me!
The Y!