Odds and Ends

Here's a catch up post on some random things.

On April 26th, we attended a Stake Conference Broadcast for all the LDS stakes in North Eastern America. We were pleasantly surprised when Elder Neil L. Andersen mentioned Brian during his talk. Elder Andersen was discussing member missionary work and was sharing photos and missionary stories of members in our region. It was kind of surreal to see Brian's picture on the screen. However, the caption under the photo identified Brian as "Robert Westover". (He is not, nor has he ever been named Robert.) Somewhere along the line, as the story of Brian sharing the gospel with one of our friends here in NY was passed from said friend to our Stake President and then on to Elder Anderson, Brian's name got changed. The mistake was no big deal to us, we just laughed at it, and Brian was very good-natured in receiving the teasing from friends in our ward (lots of people calling him "Bob") and correcting the confusion in ward members that we don't know very well. It was just a very cool experience.

We received a few texts throughout the day from other LDS friends that live in the NY area, who had also seen the broadcast but weren't in our ward. When we called to tell Brian's parents about it, they already knew. Some of those who had texted us used to live in said parents' ward, and had texted them as well. We all had a good laugh about it, and Brian was known as Robert for a couple of weeks.

A few weeks later, we learned that Brian's Mom had written a letter to Elder Andersen, and among other things, informed him of the mistake. They received a letter from him and called to let us know that we would probably receive a similar one in a couple days. Even knowing it was coming, it was still a a bit intimidating to find a letter addressed to Brian from the Quorum of the Twelve in our mailbox.

Along with a very nice letter from Elder Andersen, the envelope contained a copy of the talk with Brian's name corrected in the text and under the photo slides. It was another unexpected and pleasant event, and we were happy to receive a copy of the talk, because we couldn't find one anywhere online.

In our neighborhood, there is this little mini library that appears on the sidewalk during the summer months. It's a spot where people are encouraged to take a book and/or leave a book, all for free. There aren't always books, and when there are it's a hit or miss whether there is something you're interested in. It's so fun to see the wide variety of books that show up there...anything from paperback novels, comics, reference books, to math, science and art textbooks. Quite honestly, I was very surprised to see this little library work, when it first appeared. Don't get me wrong, we live in a really good neighborhood, but it's still a great big city, right? And anything "free to the public" usually gets taken advantage of when there's so many people around. So I thought for sure that the first stack of books would disappear, and then no new ones would appear. I was happy to be proved wrong.

Every time we walk by, Brian stops to check what books are available. Many a stack of books have appeared in our house that have come from this little box.

He caught me snapping a picture of him! :)

It doesn't seem like we have as many beautiful, colorful sunsets in NY as in Idaho. Nearly every every summer evening in Idaho, the sky is painted in pinks, yellows, reds, oranges, and purples as the sun sinks below the horizon. I know that there are sunsets here in NY because I've seen some really pretty ones, but it just doesn't seem to be as frequent. In all honestly, there probably are just as many sunsets, but we just don't notice them because there are too many buildings in the way. When you're in the middle of Manhattan there's too many buildings that block your view of the sky, or in Queens there's a building that's taller than ours on the west side that cuts off our view.

So a few weeks ago, when bright orange light flooded our apartment as the sun was setting, I knew it had to be a great one. It was so intense that it seemed like there was a very large fire outside our window. This is not a regular occurrence--usually as the sun sets, our apartment just becomes dim and dark (that is until I flip on a light). So I grabbed my camera and headed up to the roof to take some pictures. I was not wrong...the sky was spectacular. I love how the pictures turned out, even though they don't really show the intensity of the colors. It was beautiful, and if I kept my gaze far enough above the rooftops, it almost felt like home.

When I heard that there was going to be a new Jurassic Park movie coming out, I got super excited. I love Jurassic Park. When the original Jurassic Park movie came out, my Grandma (mom's mom) took all of us older cousins to the theater to watch it. I think she might have taken us to the second or third one too. It was so much fun and a memory that I cherish. She jumped at the scary parts along with the rest of us, and was just excited about it after we left the theater as we were. I made Brian promise to take me to see it, as it was a tradition, and he did.

Side note: We used to have a theater in our neighborhood called Sunnyside Center Cinema, that we loved to go to because it was cheap ($5 matinee, $7.00 regular) and close by. It wasn't the fanciest of theater's, and most often there were only a few people there with us, if any at all. The first show we saw there was one of the Harry Potter movies, and it had Spanish subtitles (it was only a few months after we had moved here and another reminder that we were no longer in Idaho). I remember being so confused at first, because I was automatically trying to read the subtitles and couldn't understand them, but still was able to understand the move because they were speaking English. A very weird moment for my brain. Haha! Anyway, that theater has since closed, so we have gone to our last couple of movies in Manhattan, at Times Square actually. The theaters there are much more expensive, so we don't go very often anymore.

I met Brian at the theater after he got off work, and we bought our tickets and a splurged on a bit of candy. Junior mints at the movie theater is another tradition for me.

You have to remember that buildings in Manhattan are tall not wide, so we ended up riding escalators up four or five floors before we came to our theater. Along the way, on one floor, I caught sight of this display for the new peanuts movie and had to stop and get a picture for my mom, who LOVES Charlie Brown. He was a bit scuffed up and Snoopy was missing an ear (New York is a tough place to make it) but they were still cute.

The movie ended up being really great and we had a lot of fun. 

Brian got Friday, July 3rd off from work for the holiday. We had a fun three day weekend, mostly just hanging out at home. It was nice to have some time off together. We spent the afternoon of the 4th making Star Wars sugar cookies (Brian got the cookie cutters from a work event). 

We had a lot of fun frosting them, even though our piping (from a sandwich bag) needs some work. It must have been a bit stressful for Brian, because when we finished he sat back (we were working in our living room on our coffee table) and immediately fell asleep. Haha! He probably just didn't want to help clean up. I think they turned out cute, and they tasted delicious. Brian loved the Darth Vader cookies and my favorite were the storm troopers. 

The evening of the 4th, we ate our traditional dinner of take-out fried chicken from KFC, and watched the Macy's firework's show from our roof. Usually there is just an Indian family from the neighboring building up there with us, but this year there was quite a crowd. Another group of people were already up there. We all crowded together on one side of the roof to get the best view of the fireworks. It was a really fun show this year, with a few different fireworks than they normally have.

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Except, for us, the view was nothing like the photo above. It was more like the photo below, only much further away, and more buildings in the way, that blocked the bottom 1/3-1/2 of the biggest fireworks and all of the smaller, low altitude ones. What we could see of it was awesome, and the ones we couldn't see, still lit up the clouds quite a bit.

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We yearn for the days when we can be closer to family and celebrate the 4th with them, with traditions that we grew up with. However, until then, I think we've found a tradition that's fun and works for us.

The Young Women's president in our ward asked me to come and teach the girls how to plant something in a pot on Tuesday, July 7th. I was so excited. The Friday before, I headed to Home Depot to look for some plants that we could use. Brian happened to have that day off, so he decided to come with me. I had a lot of fun looking at all the plants, and eventually settled on some small pots of ivy. After browsing through some nearby stores (Michaels--one of my favorites), we headed home.

I had so much fun talking to the girls and leaders about the general care of plants, and showing them how to pot up the ivy. We were able to divide the plants really easily, ensuring that there were enough for everyone. I hadn't gotten to play in soil in such a long time, and hadn't realized how much I'd missed it until my hands were working with it! Planting pots, planters, and hanging baskets was my absolute favorite part of the job when I worked at a greenhouse in Idaho. I went home with dirt under my fingernails and a huge smile on my face! It was heaven. 

And they were gracious enough to give me a plant, because they ended up having extra. I love it and the pot.