Finally becoming a "Twilight" Fan

Ok. Ok. I get it. I get it. I finally get what all the talk is about. Twilight is awesome! However, I haven't quite gotten around to read the books yet. You are looking at a person who hasn't even finished reading Harry Potter either. I hope to have them all read by Jan. 1, 2009. I still have about 39 more days...right? And as soon as my brother's friend gives back my Twilight book I will start reading it. However this post is about my experience of having to get up and go wait in line really early in the morning with thousands of other people around the country to see the midnight showing of Twilight. I woke up at 4:50 a.m. on Thursday morning and left to get in line at the theater in my town thinking I would be maybe the sixth in line at least. Boy was I ever wrong. Turns out I was about the twentieth in line at about 5:10 a.m. The girls at the front of the line had gotten there around 1:30 a.m. Finally after waiting for about an hour and twenty minutes (about 6:30) we noticed the owner/manager was there and had started turning on all of the lights. Everyone then started getting up and somehow knew that he was going to open a half hour early. We were right. He had opened the doors at 6:31 on the dot. When I got to the door there was a sign posted on it saying that they were giving away signed "Host" books, which got everybody excited then. After standing in line maybe 5 minutes I had achieved what I went there to do. I got my midnight showing ticket.

Yes, it is a little wrinkled, but hey I was freezing standing in that very very long line later that night. After of course having to go to work for 3 1/2 hours and then having to race home and going to the movies with my family and seeing how long it was a 7:00 p.m. didn't surprise me after seeing Harry Potter with the same amount of people in line for that midnight showing was nothing. Then after coming out of my earlier movie and seeing how long the line was then and how cold the weather was started to put doubts in my head. Like maybe I should have waited until Saturday to see it. We went home and I grabbed a quick bite to eat (2 grilled cheese sandwiches) and set out for the now really long line. I wasn't even there 20 minutes when the line started moving (this is the reason why my ticket is kind of wrinkled). While we were staning there freezing, a lady walked by and handed out plastic vampire teeth to go along with the movie. Some people already had them in thier mouth with in seconds of receiving them.

Then we got word of when we got to the door we had to have our tickets in hand and they would also give us a blue ticket and they were going to be holding a drawing for 2 books. One was "The Host" signed by Stephanie and the other was a movie guide book about the movie. After filing through the doors every one immediately started for theater 2 to find seats. I had chosen one in the second row on the end on the righthand side. I was there for about 30 minutes when Allison, an honorary member of my stake singles branch asked me if I would switch seats so a mother and her 30 year old daughter could sit together because it was her birthday and I said sure. I only move one row back and then I soon found out that the couple I was sitting by and the mother of the girl who had just turned 30 had been drinking before coming to the movie. I didn't mind that and I didn't mind me having to move down 2 more seats due to the fact that the guy I was sitting by had a severe case of claustrophobia. As it turns out I had a better seat and didn't have to crank my head to the left anymore. Then at about 11:45 p.m. they held the drawings and then quickly started the show afterwords. However, I was one of those unlucky ones who didn't win.

I really enjoyed to movie and my favorite part of the movie is the "So the lion fell in love with the lamb" part. I also enjoyed watching Edward and Bella and how they couldn't stop eachother from leaving one another. And I thought Robert did a good job playing Cedric Diggory...

ITS HALLOWEEN!

This year at our halloween party we had quite a few people show up. We also had a really good menu for dinner. There was Howling wings, funeral potatoes, red slimy goop salad, cheesey ghosts, melted witch puddles, donuts, and for drink we had Harry Potter Butter Beer and Gummy Worm Punch. All very good I might add. We also had skeleton finger carrots for vegies. As people showed up, we began to notice the different costumes they were wearing.

Even the Woodhouses got into having fun. Here is sis. Jones (our chinese girl) dressing Bro. Woodhouse as hop along Sally.

We had people dressed as cows and fairy tale creature things.We also had Indians, Elton John, a missionary, a European bar maid, Politicians John McCain and Sara Palin even stopped by. We also had a wood sprite, cowgirl, and a few more really good costumes. I however, went as the unsuspected elf or maybe I was also a Canadian just like my friend Mindy. Maybe I was just dressed as an elf, like the elves in The Santa Clause 3 eh.I should have said "Welcome to Canada, eh." Sister Hobson and I went through a lot of work putting this really cool party together and I especially had fun coming up with a design and model a costume game. It was a blast. My favorite two were of Jason and Josh modeling their made up costumes.


Don't these boys look really cute...cute enough to date?

2008 Summer Fun

The summer of 2008 for me started out with a bang. Our summer activities for my church start by going up to Melcher Mine and having a BBQ and 4-wheeling up to the mines or down to the creek, which I thought was fun until one year when I ended up on the back of a 4-wheeler that my brother was driving. I hate being on the back of 4-wheelers because I have no control of what will happen or where I want to go. Any way to finish the short story that ended in disaster a few times in the summer of 2007, it all began enjoying a ride down to the creek with my brother driving and me on the back were cruising down the hill with some friends when Abram noticed the fence to the creek wasn't open and had almost hit it so we waited until he opened it and proceeded down the path to the creek. When we got to the creek we turned around and headed back up the path then we came to the fence again and this time our friend Liza and her friend were tangled in it because they didn't see it and hit it head on. Abram decided to help the get untangled and Wes and I decided to head back up to the Mansion. On our way back up we hit the trail (that was already uneven and at about a 30 degree slant) wrong and lost control of the ATV and flipped it. Lucky thing there was a seat on the ATV that prevented it from flipping any more or it would have been more serious. I was holding the ATV up with my feet and Wes was trying to push it back up onto the trail with no luck. I suffered a dislocated shoulder and some scratches due to falling in some sage brush. Wes, well he was the lucky one with no injuries. We waited for about 10 minutes before any one showed up and I walked the 50 feet or so back to the Mansion with Sis. Hobson. That little incedent scared me pretty good. So when I learned that we were going to start our 4-wheeling activities again this summer I was pretty nervous.



Here is Sis. Jones and Jessica preparing for our BBQ dinner on the front porch of the mansion.




Some of the people opted to go 4-wheeling before dinner and missed out on the nice hot hamburgers that had just come off the grill and the other delicious food we had. Thanks to our wonderful feed the flock committee. I think Crystal had had wonderful time eating.
Here is Brother Barker taking the opportunity to teach some of the newbies on how to play some pool down in the basement of the mansion. Brother Barker could play pool for hours down there. We actually had to force him out of there for dinner.
Awe the Mansion itself, notice the smoke? No the mansion is not on fire. Pres. Jones thought it would be nice and BBQ just outside of the basement door and it filled the front side of the house with smoke. That was just wonderful because people had to get their food and suffer watery eyes (due to the smoke) at the same time.
After eating a really good dinner, my brother Wes, my friend Mindy and I thought it would be nice to take a hike and see how close we could get to the last remaining patch of snow before the summer heat melted it away.

However, we quickly discovered it was farther up than we had anticipated, plus, the remaining mountain was way too steep to climb. We did have a wonderful hike though.

Then one day Mindy found out that she will be co-hosting a dance group from Siberia for our annual International Dance Festival. Boy was she in for the long haul. She did things she only dreamed of doing. She even let them smack her with a horses tail during a prayer before dinner one night. In the pic below they were teaching the kids on of the traditional dances. I decided to take 2 of my neighbors kids to it so they could get a feel for the different cultures around the world. Aren't their costumes pretty?

This next picture is the Russian Cussacks. We learned that they start dancing at the age of 3 and they are very talented. Just watching them spin around the room made me dizzy. I have to admit these Russian boys were actually kind of cute.
In the picture below is Johnny see how much fun he had with the Cossacks? Oh, we can't for get Jacob, he is the one sitting by the Cossack with the blue shirt on. They learned so much form these guys.
Before luch we kind of missed the performance by the Chinese, but we did mangae to sneak in and get some autographs and pictures of them. They have really pretty costumes and some even speak really good English. I was surprised to see that they were even promoting the Summer Olympics by hanging up some Olympic flags next to their Chinese flags.
Before we saw the Chinese we were so busy learning how to dance the Dutch way Johnny and Jacob stayed in the back and had trouble learning the steps to this dance. I think the reason why Johnny had trouble learning it was because he was watching one of the Dutch girls (who is not in the pic.) Later he said she was not bad looking. I told him that she was probably at least 5 years older than he is.
Jake and Johnny really enjoyed learning how to be on the Dutch flag team and leaning how to fly the flags and spin them in the air.


We also got to see the French. This picture is Johnny wipping is face at the end of one of the dances they learned. At the end the girls kissed the boys on the cheek. Johnny just happened to be dancing with a really old French women who looked scary beyond all reason. Lets just say he wasn't too impressed with the French.

The picture below is Johnny dancing with the lady mentioned above...before the kiss.
This is the French teaching the kids a song about a duck, I think.
Ah, India. They were a really fun group to see. In the picture below, they are doing the camel dance. ( I think that is what it is called) In order to make the camel they took 2 boys and put them back to back then layed another boy on top of them using his feet as the head and neck.
Aren't the girls costumes pretty?
Seeing India, gave me a more clear background of the culture of my friend Tarjani who is originally from India. (well at least her parents are)

Finally, to wrap up our summer FHE activities we had one last boating extraviganza at the Hobson's dock. Here is bro. Hobson doing what he does best pulling the water weinnie and trying to put people in the water.

HOLD ON!
Poor Josh. he now has to swim back to the weinnie.
Climbing back on for another go at it.
Ready to go for a wild ride on the weinnie

This picture below is a very rare one. It is Brother Barker Water Skiing. He has really good moves for an old guy.


One last run on the weinnie. This time it was Sam, Jordan, and Tom's turn for a wild ride.
Here we go. Hold on.

Here is the branches most eligible bachlor Josh and Sister Barker going for a boat ride with Brother Barker. Bye. Have fun. Don't get wet.

Climbing back on.



This was our last summer activity. The branches annual campout at Steadman's in Raft River. Wes and I din't get to stay the night and enjoy the other activities, so we got in as much as we could before leaving. This is Allison, Jessica, and Kendra going down on the tube. Hold on.




Here is Mindy enjoying a jump on the trampoline and getting some excercise in before she embarked on the long ride to Utah to see her sister.

Sister Barker and her grandaughter trying to pull the tube up a slightly steep hill after enjoying a wild ride down the slip and slide. See the wet grass? That wasn't from the water off of the slide. Earlier we had a rain storm move through the area and I really thought that our campout was going to be canceled, but it wasn't.
Here is Wes daring to go head first down on the tube. Hold on and don't get hurt.
Mindy was so conviently conned into attempting something she would never do to get hurt, but Allison and Jessica got her to go any way. Have Fun.
Later, when brother Hobson got there, they pulled out the all popular Potato Gun and let everyone take turns shooting potatoes over everyone who was on the slip and slide.


Here is the mighty Lacie getting ready to shoot her potato and trying to convince Timbri that it is her turn next.


Here is Kendra, Allison, and Jessica daring to go double tube down the slip and slide

Here is our ever brave Pres. Jones getting ready to go down on something you will never catch me on.

How high did it go Krystal?
Here is sis. Jones and Lacie riding double on a tube. Hold on.
Awe. How cute. Pres. Jones and Sis. Jones taking a ride together.
Hold of Sis. Hobson. Have Fun.
We did so many things this summer that I only chose the best ones to post. Hope you enjoyed looking through the pictures.