A Classy? weekend in Denver

This weekend Ry and I had the privilege of going to Denver for Allison Hollingsworth's wedding.

It was our first paid flight since the grand exodus from the airport job, but Ry still got the tickets early enough to use his connections for us to sit in

First Class. It was a red eye so we mostly slept, but man I was determined to enjoy that extra leg room.

From here though we rented a car from Dollar and went to stay at the

Star Motel....notice that Star is singular....that's about how many it deserved. But we weren't complaining...we arrived at 5 am so all I cared about was head hitting pillow (I did hesitate ever so slightly though about what could be on that pillow).

Besides an interruption from housekeeping, we slept soundly all through the afternoon only slightly feeling guilty for sleeping the day away and not enjoying Denver. But we reasoned that we were only there for the wedding anyway. Which was held at the

Embassy Suites. (yes, we could have stayed there, but Ry was still in his "standby we don't know if we're going to make it mode so he didn't book a room in time". But oh well. The wedding was beautifully done and we were able to make acquaintance with some of our old Southridge friends...

Rob Thurston (#5 and #17)

Nick and Madeline Kowen (#27?)

Todd and his wife Jenny Eggington (#17)

We had a great time reminiscing about the ceiling falling in, and the toilets leaking on kitchen tables, etc.

Since we had had such a leisurely afternoon, my normal 10pm cranky self was surprisingly awake and Ry and I decided to go search out a midnight showing of The Simpson's movie. We found exactly 1...and had a great time watching. Although I was annoyed with the song "Spider Pig" running through my head all night.

Sunday we decided to get back to being classy so we toured the Denver Art Museum. We both love Art Museums, but I said to Ry, "oh good, you and I will go through this quickly." Don't you hate when you are with someone at a museum and you have to walk through it painstakingly slow because you assume that the other person is really into it, but really they're just staring at the sign thinking, "why on earth are we still staring at this?" but no one has the guts to say anything because you don't want to disturb the sacredness of the moment?

Anyway, I won't go into our views of modern art, but let's just say that we got quite a kick out of the Bubbles exhibit and the giant skull on top of a wagon wheel. But of course, we feel a lot more cultured, so here we are in front of this fabulous display:

After this, we were thoroughly cultured out so we went to my childhood memory of a restaurant Casa Bonita...

for those of you who have never heard of it... you need to. It is the Disneyland of Mexican Restaurants. You stand in line to order and then to get your food and then to be seated hopefully by the waterfall which we were, in order to get a good view of the cliff divers. And then when you have stuffed yourself, you can be entertained by the puppet shows, hitting the pinata, going through Black Bart's cave, the magic show, gift shop, and Arcade. Since we had plenty of time to kill before our flight we spent about 3 1/2 hours in here. But it was worth it since I happened to have a very exciting moment:

Yes, ladies and gentlemen...I threw my ball into the 10,000 pt pocket of skeeball. I think I can now die happy. (Although does it count since this game was titled, Ice Ball?)

I've always said that I have wanted to live in Colorado, and this trip definitely affirmed that desire.

Muggle Life

Thanks, Lori for reminding me that real life is much better than fiction. I am procrastinating as I sit here looking at my stacks of dishes, piles of laundry, dirty carpet, empty fridge, half packed suitcases, chipped toenails, and unused treadmill. But I am grateful for all of these things because it means that I have:

a great husband
great friends and family
wonderful teenagers that teach me a lot about life
a house to clean after I get it messy
Books to get lost in
places to travel to



and a faith to rely on

But now I really do have to get going to all of those things because I have EEK! guests coming at 5 and a plane to catch at 10!



But first, would like to recap some of my favorite girls camp adventures:

1. It didn't rain!!!! Thank you thank you thank you!
2. The latrines did not smell/look nearly as bad as they have in the past...and I actually got the girls to clean them this time!
3. We didn't have to cook...the stake did it this year...leaving me more time to
4. bond with the girls...you should've heard them when I said that they could do my eye liner Egyptian style and my hair Scene style...whatever that means
5. one girl from another ward said that I was her favorite leader ever...come on, how could you not like that?
6. We won the spirit stick the first day...and stole it the 2nd day...something that hadn't happened in 5 years...my competitive nature had to like that
7. I got to witness the miraculous recovery of a girl with huge medical problems after a priesthood blessing
8. Did I mention that it didn't rain?
9. I got to know lots of other leaders that I'm sure will be great friends
10. I learned that even the most sweet and quiet girls can be mean! and that when you are stuck together all week that your true colors really come out. I learned that I could pull myself on a zip line that was running too slowly. But most importantly, I learned that no matter how many times I bear my testimony to my girls that they will never stop needing to hear it. And that praying for a tent crammed full of 14 girls is one of the sweetest experiences I will ever have.

I've always been a big believer in Third Times a Charm and sure enough, this third year of camp was probably the best ever! It didn't rain!

Katie is used as the model here
My transformation was not as dramatic

There really are 14 of them in there!

And now...I officially trudge back to normal life. And I am happy, mostly, to do so.

I'm Finished...

Just Keep Swimming...

is the tune I have had in my head all week as I have prepared to go to Girls Camp. I leave tomorrow bright and early. But I feel like I have been there already since for the last 7 days as I have been eating, drinking, walking, talking, and dreaming of nothing but camp. My lists were outrageous. I always had a pen in my hand. I would wake up and write down 3 more things to get. I couldn't take a shower without mentally adding to my checklist. I even involved my sweet husband in my madness: "potholders and red vines" I told him to write down as I sunk my head into the pillow one night. As I awoke the next morning I was very grateful for him because I had remembered the red vines, but could not come up with pot holders for the life of me until I saw his note on the fridge.

In addition, I feel like I have become an artist and an elementary school teacher over night. Here are some of the projects I have been working on this week that I am PRAYING don't get ruined by rain. Please pray that it won't rain this week on us. Please!

Our theme is Australia and we threw in a little Finding Nemo in there as well. I have made:


Water bottles with every one's name
designed a label that I ironed on tote bags (more ironing than I've done in a year)
made poster after poster complete with our very own East Australian Current
and much much more.

The most exciting thing is that because of all of this I have been able to talk my husband into getting a laminating machine which is my school supply organizational freak dream come true. I have had way too much fun with that thing.

So I have off for an adventurous week. I am actually very excited. We have a total of 16 girls going which is awesome for us. I will miss the blogging world, but it's worth it to see the girls camp testimony meeting. There's nothing quite like em.

On a side note, also this week as I have been obsessed with clown fish and sea turtles, we have made an exciting addition for our very own live turtle Sam. He has a new home! He is much happier and we are much happier that he doesn't make the house smell as much!

It has been said that you should do something that scares you half to death everyday

This was mine yesterday:

These are pictures from our first annual Fitzgibbons Family Boat Trip on Lake Mead. I attempted to water ski for the second time in my life, and although I did much better than 12 years ago, I still have yet to feel like I have mastered this sport. It is hard! Jill did a smashing job despite her fears, and of course Ryan showed us all how it's done.

After conquering this feat, we all discovered how fun it can be to be pulled at 40 mph while laying on an inner tube. Hopefully you can sort of tell from the pictures that we all had a great time!

We are hangover today, however, from sore muscles and sunburns (yes Mom, we did reapply-a lot).

Stupified...

is how I feel right now...note the time. 3:40 am. I would not stay up this late for any reason other than to go to the midnight showing of...

Thanks, Anne for letting me steal your picture. Anyway, I won't give my thoughts because I don't want to ruin anything for any of you out there who will actually get some sleep tonight and see it tomorrow like a normal person. But as soon as you're ready I would love to discuss!

Good night!

The Best Two Years

It's official: Ryan turned in his badge last week. He is no longer an employee of America West/US Airways.

"Why?" you may ask. We can't begin to give an explanation that won't lead to the response of "you're crazy" so we will just simply say that we knew it was time. Ha-you can't argue with that.


Our very last free flight was coming home from Disneyland, of course. Despite our grand knowledge of this place, we still found plenty of new thrills-standing in line for 3 hours for the re-opened Submarine ride for instance. This year's Disney theme is the Year of a Million Dreams. We were privileged enough to take part of this by getting prime seating for the Fantasmic show-something we had never watched before. And it was great to have my mom with us to show her how to do Disney Fitz style. It was the perfect trip to end our own Year of a Million Dreams, and I do believe there were a few tears shed as we jumped ahead to the employee security line, ordered our First Class peanuts, and deplaned for the last time as important travelers.


These last two years have been spontaneous and unexpected and we have loved every minute of our traveling experiences-okay maybe not. Did we love getting stranded in Rome or praying that we would make the flight to Recife and then jumping through the door as the flight attendant closed it on us? Okay, yes we did. The highlight of our trips was probably our trip to Brasil to visit Ry's mission and spending a few days on the Amazon. I still like to lord over him the fact that his wife could catch 2 piranhas, and he- despite the fish jumping out of the water into the boat -could catch none.

Don't worry though-our adventures are not over. I'm sure that we will still have plenty of travels to add to our Christmas letter (that I'm stepping all over by keeping this blog). We will just have to pay for them instead.


We actually got a taste of that last night when we bought a plane ticket for me to go to Utah...on Southwest!

Gulp. I guess Ry and I are back to sponsoring the official airline of our family.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Well, after eagerly finishing this 6th book in anticipation of the last I have come to a few conclusions:

1. I still believe Snape is good despite all of the evidence against him. I also believe that he was following Dumbledore's orders to kill him.

2. I believe that the possible Horcrux's are:

1. The Diary- destroyed by Harry


2. The Ring-destroyed by Dumbledore


3. Hufflepuff's cup- see page 436


4. Syltherins' locket- see page 437- almost recovered by Harry and Dumbledore. RAB I believe to be Regulus Black-Sirius brother who was killed by Voldemort after refusing to return to his service.


5. Nagini-Voldemort's snake made into a Horcrux when he killed the Muggle caretaker-see page 506


6. Something of Ravenclaw's or Gryffindor's: I believe the goblin made tiara Mrs. Weasley is willing to let Fleur use for the wedding-see page 623. Or I believe it to be one of Sirius' possessions that Mundungus has stolen-see pages 345-6.


7. Voldemort himself of course

3. Kreacher has left Hogwarts and gone to Bellatrix to divulge the Order's secrets. Harry made a similar mistake as Sirius when he said, "Get out of it"-see page 453

4. Dumbledore is dead of his own accord-but he will still communicate with Harry somehow in the 7th book

5. Despite his friends all being there to help him (pg. 651) he will face Voldemort completely alone, and that more significant parental figures of Harry's will need to die (like Lupin?)

So there you go-feel free to disagree with me and we'll all see what happens in a few weeks!

Oh Say Can You See...

By the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, thro' the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watch'd, were so gallantly streaming?

And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there. O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

Happy 4th of July!