Christmas Time!

PICTURES TO COME!

Dylan and I had such a great Christmas. It was our first together and one of the best I've had. We spent Christmas in Oregon with Dylan's family. Tom and Glenda completely spoiled us, me especially, as they didn't want me to be sad for my first Christmas away from my family. Everything was just so much fun! We spent as much time as possible with Mom and Dad, and Carly, Shem, Stella and Olive. Those girls are getting so big. Dylan went skiing with his buddy Simon one day and Mom had to work so Dad and I took the morning to solve some work problems [yes, this was fun to me!] then headed over to Carly's to hang out with her. We went sledding in their back yard [Shem had made a small slide off their one step porch for Stella] then Shem and Dad headed out to do some hunting while Carly and I headed to the kitchen to make some melting snowman cookies :) On Christmas Eve we had a little family program. Dad and I played an "O Holy Night" duet on the piano [that my Harston family LOVES. We play it about a million times every Christmas. Not exaggerating], Mom sang a song with Dad accompanying, Carly and Shem sang with Shem playing the guitar, and Dylan and I sang with Dyl playing along. Dad read the Christmas story then we had our gift exchange. It was different and fun to open presents on Christmas Eve. Christmas morning we woke up to a small gift from Santa. We went to Mom's parent's house for "dinner' [at noon]. It was fun being with Mom's family and hearing stories of them when they were young. Particular favorites were stories of cow pie filled apples and secret tunnels. When we got home later that afternoon Dylan and I borrowed a car from Dad and headed to Washington. We hadn't planned on a trip but I was so homesick that we decided to make one. What I didn't know before was that my parents were planning to drive down on Monday and surprise me! By us going to Washington we were able to see more family. They also didn't know we were coming. It was so awesome to walk in that door and see the surprise on everyone's faces! We spent all day Sunday with my family. I enjoyed it so much. I tried to make up for a whole season's missed of Christmas baking in one day haha. Monday morning we headed back to Oregon and took little Stella sledding at the golf course where she had a bigger hill. I accidentally found a little jump and got some pretty good air off of it, considering the size of the jump. Tuesday morning came too soon and Dylan and I headed back to the airport to fly back to Provo. Every time we go home to visit it gets harder and harder to leave! It was such a great Christmas though. Definitely one of the best I have ever had. I am so fortunate to have two amazing families. Tom and Glenda and family have welcomed me with open arms and no reservations. I always feel right at home with them. Haha I even accidentally called Tom Daddy, which I usually reserve just for my Dad. I really cannot put into words how blessed I feel to be a part of two of the most excellent, amazing, wonderful, and overall stupendous families.

Christmas Concert

Dylan's Aunt Edye is in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and sent us tickets to the Christmas concert. I was so excited! I had never been to an event in the Conference Center. December 18th rolled around and we bundled up and headed to Salt Lake City. We got there with an hour and a half until the show started and were worried we wouldn't get in! There were so many people there! Finally we got in and found our seats. I don't have other Mormon Tabernacle Choir Christmas events to compare it to....but this was excellent! The set was amazing and they had dancers with some of the songs. David Archuleta was a guest performer along with Michael York. I'm not the biggest fan of David Archuleta but he did an amazing job. I didn't even know who Michael York was but I was still excited to hear from him. I was expecting him to sing too and couldn't wait for him to take stage. I was pleasantly surprised when, instead of singing, he told stories. He told the story of the origin of the Choir, and the Christmas story. He did a phenomenal job. The way he spoke and the passion he put into his words was so captivating. The only thing I would have wished to different was to hear more from just the Choir. Overall we had such a great time!

Freaking Adorable

My nephew Lance :)

Oogloo

Dylan's exclamation [upon driving past a decorated yard] "Oh look! An oogloo!"

[not the yard we passed, but a visual reference as to what an "oogloo" actually is]

Tonight's Agenda

completed my final final

homemade Christmas decorations [ignore my messy work area!]

my take on the Mackintosh rose. out of color aid paper. no reason.

what will soon be 4 dozen pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. again, no reason. in fact i already have too many chewy oatmeal cookies to fit in my cookie jar....

Mittens!

Survival

I know most of the people that read this are family so have already heard this but I just love this song so I wanted to post it! This is Dylan's latest. Check it out! 

Survival

The Tale of Three Brother, Finished

......maybe. For lack of time it isn't necessarily exactly what I wanted and I may still edit it if I find time later....but here it is!

Update: It's been spell checked. Hopefully I've fixed all the typos!

Thought of You

Thought of You from Ryan Woodward on Vimeo.

This guy is a professor at BYU. This is amazing.

The Tale of Three Brothers, Part 1

Here is the begininnging to my final for my illustration class. We had to do sequential art. I love this story from Harry Potter [yes I know I am a huge nerd] and so used that. This is drawn in red pencil and then I inked over it then scanned it in.  This way I can put a filter on the picture and the red wont even show up. Next: coloring!

Never Again

I've never been a fan of pepto-bismol. To be honest I've never had it, so I'm probably not being fair to it. Last night my stomach was a little upset and I couldn't sleep. Dylan was determined I take some. I decided if it would help me feel better, I'd take it. He brings in the pink goopy liquid smelling of peppermint. I went to down it in one swallow and it was one of the most disgusting things I have ever tasted. It was like drinking toothpaste. Dylan stood over me and made sure I drank it all. He wanted me to lick the cup out. When I refused he poured water and the rest of the pepto into a cup and wanted me to drink it. In the struggle I accidently spilled it.....on Dylan's pillow. It really was an accident though! I jumped up and poured that nasty concauction down the sink. I will never again take pepto-bismol.  

Application Done!

I'm so ecstatic! I just submitted my application for the graphic design program at BYU. This is LONG overdue. I planned on applying a year ago but they changed the application process without notifying anyone until it was actually time to apply. This put me a YEAR behind! Talk about annoying. Anyway I have just submitted my application and should find out the last week in December if I made it into the program. I'm so nervous but it is out of my hands now. Here is what my portfolio looks like. The quality of the pictures isn't the best because they had to be a certain number of pixels to turn in.....so this is what you get!

Pen and ink. 2009

Mixed media. 2008

Ink on bristol paper. 2010

Pen and ink. 2009

Color aid paper on bristol paper. 2010

Mixed media. 2010

Photoshop. 2010

Ink on bristol paper. 2010

Acrylic paint on watercolor paper. 2010

Graphite on sketch paper. 2009

Glen and Diane

I found this today and couldn't not share.

Glen and Diane Harston March 31, 1980

Glen and Diane Harston 2009

My parents are so cute.

Oh the Weather Outside is Frightful

(This has nothing to do with this post. This was taken on Mt. Rainier
a few years ago and I felt this post needed a snowy picture)

Today there is a severe weather warning. There is supposedly suppose to be a winter storm today that should far surpass anything that Provo/SLC area has seen, probably for the last several years. We haven't seen any sign of it besides a gray sky and snow in the mountains. I'm a little excited for the blizzard to come though so Dylan and I can hunker down and drink hot cocoa and watch movies. It's kind of an excuse for us to do nothing at all! The reality is though that Dylan work a trillion hours this week and I have loads of homework. So we will see what really happens.

On the downside of bad weather, my parents and little brothers were coming to Utah to spend Thanksgiving with us and my brother's family (who live 4 blocks from us) but because of the bad weather they had to cancel. My parents live in Enumclaw, WA and have been hit with tons of snow! It is so unusual for where they live. My dad works in Bellvue, about 45 minutes away, and is working from home because the weather is so bad. So even before we had our storm warning here they had to cancel their trip. I'm pretty bummed about it but at least we still have family close to spend Thanksgiving with.

UPDATE: It snowed a little bit last night. Less than an inch. They shut down schools, stores, and restaurants because of the bad weather that never came. The storm didn't really hit lower than Lehi.

Gingerbread Houses

Dylan and I had some friends over and we built gingerbread houses! I had baked most of the houses the day before and was so anxious for everyone to come over so I could finally decorate! We made the frosting and Dylan and I put our house together to make sure it would hold. We scored since not only did the frosting make our home solid as a rock, but it tasted yummy too! They say a picture is worth a thousand words.....and there were definitely lots of words said! We were all laughing so hard and had such a good time! P.s. I promise there was not sabotage on our part!

Dylan and Heather's

Nick and Tiffany's. They had a pool full of liquid gold haha.

Aaron and Amanda's

Ashton and Katie's

The final product!

Ashton and Katie's completed!

Aaron and Amanda's cookies and cream roof. Aaron slaved away at that frosting detail around the bottom :)

Dylan made it snow on our happy little house :D

The End.

Egg Hunt

Dylan LOVES hard boiled eggs. One day I made him some so he would have a treat when he got home from work. He had been at work since 8:00am and I was leaving for school before he would come home and I didn't want him to miss the eggs. So I used arrows. Dylan apparently was really confused when he walked in the door, but eventually figured it out!