Thanksgiving Break

How was your Thanksgiving? Ours was great! What a nice, needed break! Since I didn't do a Full on Friday last week because of the break, I will get you caught up a little bit on what's been happening lately.

Exciting News Well, the good news is that two Fridays ago, Justin was offered a really good job at Dish Network in Denver. We were excited to be moving up and out and going on a new adventure. It would've been a little stressful as we had to move right after Christmas, but it was a good thing because we were looking into cheaper housing since I'm not working and Justin hasn't progressed at his current job like he had hoped to. They told Justin they'd send him the contract for him to sign after the weekend. However, last Monday, they called him back and said that they decided to go with an internal candidate who had applied. For crying out loud! Justin had three interviews (phone and skype) and they even flew him out to Denver. They loved him and told him then that he basically had the job, they just needed to do paperwork and background check and references. Then, they were in the process of creating his job offer contract. When did this internal candidate apply? Why even tell Justin he got the job? How rude! We're pissed, my parents are pissed, and his parents are pissed. So, that exciting news I've been dying to share with you turned out to be a bust.  So, please keep us in your prayers as we figure out what to do about housing and job plans for next year. We have a few plans and ideas, but we'd like all the prayer power we can get. ;) Elder Christiansen's Mission My 18 year old brother, Bobby, has been gone about two weeks now at the Missionary Training Center. He is absolutely loving preparing and learning how to be a good missionary and being taught Spanish by immersion to prepare him for Argentina. He's already been able to email us twice (LDS missionaries are only allowed to email home once a week). Here a few of my favorite stories he sent: "So our first language lesson was crazy difficult. It's an immersion program so we have an instructor talk to us in fluent Spanish for three hours, while we clumsily try to understand, and reply. It's great! And it's exhausting! But it's great! Our first missionary training session had us - the missionaries arriving that day - as a panel for real investigators to ask questions....Seriously. I thought it was roleplay the whole time and then I talked to one of the instructors and he said that they were actually real investigators who had agreed to talk to us!!! That was mind-blowing! It left me with one of the first really important impressions I've had so far. "There's no hook, there's no magic answer, there's no miraculous video game trigger that will make these people believe. They're real, and should be treated as such."

"Thursday... one of the MOST amazing Thanksgivings ever. We started out by witnessing a devotional from Elder Dallin H Oaks! And he was amazing! It was mostly on the history of Thanksgiving and a hope that we keep Thanksgiving up and give thanks constantly. But I don't know... there was just something about his voice that just said "I speak with the spirit" so it was so cool. Then we had another short devotional on service. And then we went and performed a humanitarian effort. We made 357 thousand meals for families! It was a blast! I'm sad it was so quick though. I wanted to keep going! I want to know how many we could have done if we didn't have to stop early due to too few supplies (our goal was 320 thousand, so we did very well). Also! Then we had ANOTHER devotional on Thanksgiving with lots of singing and all kinds of different fun things! And then we all stood up and sang I Believe In Christ, and the spirit there was too incredible for words. Immense. Then after! They turned all the Christmas lights on! It was amazing and of course we sang some more."

"So naturally at the MTC [Missionary Training Center] there's going to be some sort of prank going on. Well, last night I walked into my apartment to find my bedsheets folded neatly on top of my closet, and they were replaced with Anna and Elsa "Frozen" bedsheets with a floral pattern and all that good stuff. My entire apartment had a good laugh when we saw those (they were from the elders next door). And being the good sport I am, I slept with them. They're actually more comfy."

Bobby is the short, centered Ginger

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving with my family. Rhys was more than excited to spend all weekend playing with the puppies and his aunts. He definitely could tell that his uncle wasn't there, and whenever he'd see a picture of Bobby, he'd point and smile. We spent the whole weekend feasting until our guts burst open, downing can after can of soda, staying up late, playing games, gossiping, talking, and laughing. And, there was no drama!!!!!

We didn't do Black Friday as we're planning a sparse Christmas this year between all the chaos of money and houses. But, I did finally replace my crappy iPhone 4 with a new iPhone 6. Thank goodness for Verizon month-by-month payments! I also got a new set of scriptures, since my old set 1) had my maiden name on it, 2) is 13 years old, 3) is falling apart. Mom also included a Welsh Book of Mormon for me, so I can practice my Welsh and still be studying the Gospel!

Justin, Rhys, and I had lunch with some of our best college buds who were in town for the holidays. They live a few hours from Denver, and were sad to hear that we weren't actually moving closer to them. (But our next door neighbors who are Justin's other best friend and wife are happy that we are staying next to them!)

It also snowed truly for the first time over the weekend. We had a mini-snow fall earlier this month, but it melted the same day. So, yesterday before church (since our congregation meets from 1-4pm), we bundled Rhys up and let him go play in the snow. He absolutely loved it!

How was your Thanksgiving Break?