This Week

...has been crazy. I started getting sick with chills and fevers last Saturday. By Sunday morning, I felt terrible, so I stayed home from church. There was a CES fireside with Elder Cook here that evening that I was required to sing at for Choir, so I had to get up for that eventually. By the next day, my sickness had morphed from really bad chills to a sore throat/cough/runny-stuffy nose, which was much better for attending classes (can you imagine me sitting in classes with the chills?) but still no fun.

Tuesday, we sang for devotional, (I, uh, haha, actually almost fainted during the practice we had just before devo, it was scary) and then that night we had a big performance rehearsal, which, gratefully, I didn't have to do any singing for, for most of it. They were videoing it, and the video was to be back up footage for the performance here on Friday, but I wasn't going to be there, so obviously they couldn't have someone in the backup footage and not in the real stuff, so I got to sit in the audience seats and listen. Our Sacred Music Project oratorio is really gorgeous this year. Sitting and listening was such a wonderful experience.

Wednesday was a brief respite from the crazy, then Thursday, I got up, went to my first two classes, cleaned, packed, and got on a bus for Pocatello with the choir. We had a performance there at this really cool building that I think is owned by ISU. This building looked like something out of Star Wars. It was probably three stories tall, but there was only the one floor, with enormously tall ceilings, and long, long, long windows and a windowed dome at the top. Really cool.

Then, afterward, while everyone else climbed back on the buses to go back to Rexburg, I met up with my new sister in law's sisters, Camilla and Mileah, and we drove the rest of the way to Salt Lake. They took me to Chris's house, where Jared, who stayed at my parents' house for the wedding, was waiting to take me home. It was nice to get to hang out with my big brothers for a bit before we had to get home.

The next day was surprisingly chill for a wedding day. I woke up when I was done sleeping, took a shower and got ready, then drove in to the temple with my sister, Gwen, and her family. Her mother in law (who was in town for my nephew Ethan's birthday) and I watched her kids while they were in the wedding.

I got to hold Ashland most of the time, but she started crying about half way through and I just couldn't get her to stop, and Tyler, Ethan and Lynn, Gwen's mother in law, had gone off on a walk together. That bit was stressful. I didn't know what to do. She'd fussed a little bit a few other times, but calmed right down when I'd pointed out flowers or let her touch trees or given her a cracker or something. None of that worked that time. I was starting to panic when, thankfully, nephews and mother in law came back. Those boys are such good big brothers to Ashland. It was so sweet how concerned they were when they came running around the corner because they'd heard her crying.

Lynn had the good idea to try putting her in her stroller and walking around, and she stopped crying soon enough. I'm not sure whether that was due more to the movement of the stroller (which Tyler pushed) or her distraction (Ethan, walking backwards in front of the stroller, making funny faces and dancing around). Those boys really are adorable brothers to that baby girl. We little sisters are so lucky/blessed!

Then the wedding was over and we all cheered as Chris and Keira came out. They are so cute together. I'm so happy for them! I've been waiting for Chris to find the right girl, and to be happy, for years. And now he has and he is. It makes me smile just to think about how happy he is.

We headed over to the chapel after that and helped set up for the family/friends luncheon, then had the luncheon, then, since Mom wasn't feeling good (funnily enough, she got sick just a few days after me and was still going through the chills) we went and took a break at Chris's house for half an hour or so. Then it was time to get back for pictures and then the reception. It's odd, being the groom's family, nobody told me what I should do with myself, so I just hung out by the table where they had a slideshow of Chris and Keira's lives going on a dvd and kept pressing play every time it got over. Also, I told people coming in where to put their presents. Small contributions, but hey, I was helping, right?

Eventually, Chris and Keira drove off in a toilet paper and shaving cream covered car and we cleaned up the church before going home with several dozen extra sandwiches and boxes and boxes of cookies.

The next day I hung out with my Daddy a bit then went up to Gwen's house to catch a bit of Ethan's birthday party. It was mad scientist themed, and they had bottles of water and dry ice on the table that smoked and looked really neat. I was only able to stay for about half and hour, though, before I had to go to Salt Lake. The choir had taken buses down here for a concert in the tabernacle and I needed to be at our first rehearsal.

After we were done rehearsing, we ate dinner in a cafeteria under the church office building. We got to it through the underground tunnel system -- it was so cool! Then we all got dressed in our performance outfits, practiced a bit, and went up into the tabernacle to sing. I didn't mention before that I didn't actually sing in any of our other performances, did I? My voice wouldn't cooperate, what with being sick and all. But last night I was finally feeling well enough that I sang everything but the highest notes. The only downside was that it made me have to cough a couple times in the middle of songs, but hopefully no one noticed.

After the concert we changed into travel clothes and I got to say goodbye to my Daddy and Jared, who'd come to watch my performance, before getting on the bus for the long ride back here.

We finally got here a bit past one in the morning (this is pre-time change time). I waited up for my roommate, Stephanie, who also went to Utah for the weekend, to go with her boyfriend to his old companion's reception. By the time I went to bed, with the time change, it was 3:30 am. I've already missed three weeks of church this semester, twice from going home and once because I was sick, and I didn't want to miss anymore, so I pulled myself out of bed at 8:30 this morning, five hours after going to sleep, to get ready for church.

Our lessons were nice, then afterwards we had choir practice and I practiced a duet which I'll be singing next week. Afterwards, I came home, ate some Ramen, and took a nice long nap.

Which has us caught up to now. Busy week, right?