Monday

Going in reverse a little bit, but oh well.

Yesterday was Blaine's orientation, but seemed like a real school day since he was gone 8-5. Look at how handsome he is next to his friend Harvey (the elk). Harvey watches over and protects us in our new home.

It turned out to be a pretty busy day. Once he got home from school, he went to go pick up the missionaries for dinner while I finished getting our hawaiian haystacks. Both these elders were from Utah and said that they hadn't had hawaiian haystacks since they were home. We had a nice, laid back conversation and then they asked us if we would come to their 2 appointments after dinner. The first person cancelled, so we went to the second appointment a little early, but before we left, one of the elders offered to say a prayer and asked that I would have help finding a job that was good for me and my current situation, since we had just mentioned that I didn't have a job but was needing to get one.

Anyways, the guy we visited was an older man with a nice Oklahoma country accent, and at the end his wife came home and joined him. He, like the rest of Oklahoma, is very friendly and very spiritual and open about religion. It turned out that he taught school and coached girls basketball for like 40 years, so he told me about a very helpful website that lists all the coaching and subsequent teaching jobs in the state. Then he got my info and I got his.

He was pretty long winded, but the message went fine and Blaine even got to play missionary again for a little bit. The missionaries set up a return appointment and then we took them back to their apartment. On the way home, one of them was so excited and said "I think that was an answer to our prayer to you trying to find a job!" It was sweet and a good reminder, since Blaine and I hadn't even really recognized the connection. So then Blaine spent the rest of the drive home saying "I wish I could be a missionary again." :)

We didn't get home until about 9, so I felt bad but Blaine was a good sport about having a busy first day and a busy night. Next week we're having the other set of elders from our ward over.

First Day of Dental School

Yesterday was Blaine's all day orientation for school where he got his scrubs and all that, but we'll talk about that later. TODAY IS HIS FIRST OFFICIAL DAY OF DENTAL SCHOOL!!! He's going to carpool with his friend for the summer semester, so Jon (the friend) picked him up today and they were on their way in their new scrubs! We'll have to see what he says about it when he gets home :)

Enjoy the creeper picture of them leaving. I just thought it'd be funny to capture the whole experience.

While Blaine's parents where here, we stopped by the school and checked it out. It has lots of grassy areas and lots of trees with a big fountain in the courtyard. The school itself is like a tornado fortress. It is undergoing construction this year and will be brand new and beautiful for his last 3 years. BUT that seems kind of far off in the distance right now. We only live about 7 minutes away from school, so I can meet him on campus for a lunch date or he can come home for dinner and then go back to study at the library if he wants. Unlike at BYU, the OU library is open 24/7. No loud theme song to run you out at midnight.

Brick Town

A couple nights ago we had ourselves an impromptu OKC date. Blaine wanted to go check out Bass Pro Shops to see how it compared to Cabelas. (I hadn't thought of the blog by that point or else I would've added a picture) Its a big outdoors store that we have in Florida a lot too- more fishing than big game hunting. Anyways, its downtown in Brick Town. So we checked out the fish, picked out the boat we'll get in a couple years, and decided that Cabelas and Scheels is still better.

As we were leaving the parking lot, we saw a sign for the Land Run Monument and decided to go check that out as well. So we walked along the canal path to the monument of the horses and wagons racing to claim their plot of land.

Then we decided that we were already sweaty, so we kept walking along the canal path and checked out Brick Town. It has lots of shops and restaurants and a movie theatre and its all brick... obviously. I'm sure we'll go back and take pictures this time, but you can check it out online. Or come and visit us and see it first hand!! Its really cute. As we were walking around we noticed that the OKC Redhawks, the triple A farm club for the Houston Astros, were playing soon. So even though we're trying to save money, we decided to be spontaneous!

So we got some dinner at the cheapest looking restaurant at Brick Town called Fuzzy's Tacos and it was pretty good food. There was also a Toby Keith's I Love This Bar and Grill which was really cool, but we decided to save that for another time when we want to spend more money. It looked like an awesome place to watch a game. Oh- back to the Brick Town Canal - there are also cute little river taxi cruises that run up and down bricktown. We didn't do it that night, but I'm sure we will soon. The Brick Town area reminds me a lot of the Riverwalk in San Antonio... but probably smaller, and not the filming location of any famous movies that I know of.

Anyways, after Fuzzy's Tacos we walked across the street to Brick Town Ballpark to watch the OKC Redhawks take on the Iowa Cubs. Tickets were cheap and there wasn't that many people there, so we decided to sit on the 5th row of the 3rd baseline, but we could've sat on the 2nd row even! During the 7th inning stretch, we sang "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" as usual, but also "Oklahoma." It was really cool. Lots of state spirit here and everyone is so friendly. But more on that to come ;)

Anyways, after the game, we followed the crowd back across the street and into Sonic for half-priced shakes and ended our spontaneous date with a treat. It was a deal we couldn't pass up... But let it be known. I still have not found a banana shake even close to rivaling Checkers'.

From Provo to OKC!

It's official - we have moved to Oklahoma City! Blaine's parents flew out from Montana to help us pack up and make the 17 hour drive. Blaine drove one car in the lead with the GPS, then Dave drove the 17 foot long U-Haul, and then the ladies (me and Charlotte) brought up the rear. Luckily we had each other and a bunch of CDs, but Blaine and Dave were so bored since they were all alone and most the time had no radio as we crossed the plains.

Wednesday morning, June 5, 2013, we drove from Provo, Utah to Denver, Colorado. We spent the night in Denver and explored some sites from Blaine's mission since his parents had never seen it. Blaine and I spent a couple days in a couple of his old areas last November and that was fun to see, but this was a quick trip. So the next night, we slept at my aunt and uncle's house in Goodland, Kansas. We watched the NBA Finals and had a nice visit with Scott and Shelly, and Blaine even got some free clothes that were too big for my cousin Nick. Friday morning we enjoyed a free McDonalds breakfast (since Scott and Shelly own the one in Goodland) and then we were back on the road for the final day... well, after some teenagers unlocked our car to get the keys out of it ;)

Friday we got to Oklahoma City around 6pm and were greeted by Blaine's friend Bryan from BYU, who brought a couple other guys from our new ward. We got everything moved inside pretty quick and then spent the next couple of days unpacking and decorating. We LOVE our new place. It is bigger, newer, and has an extra bathroom from our last apartment. We enjoyed our time at 369 East and it was a great first home for us as newlyweds, but this is a pretty sweet set up--so get your tickets and come check out our new guest sweet, complete with walk in closets, ceiling fans, and a private full bath. (We love HGTV... does it sound like it?)

Speaking of our house, we have a nice little balcony and outdoor storage closet as well. We've got our barbecue and camping chairs set up on our balcony and we face the west-- we get a view of a grassy knoll with a little path. One night we took a walk down that path (in tennis shoes to avoid chiggers!!) at sunset and saw the freeway about 1000 yards away and the city skyline beyond that. We've also used our BBQ twice in the week that we have lived here. And our second night here, we were able to sit outside and watch our first lightening and rain storm with Charlotte.

Sunday we went to church in Edmond, a suburb just north of us, and the ward was very nice. It had lots of other dental couples, but it looked like we were pretty much the only ones without a baby or 2, so we'll have to work on that. And then Tuesday night we had 2 of Blaine's friends from BYU over for elk burgers and the NBA Finals. Those guys are really nice and we all had a good time - except for the fact that the Heat got blown out of the water. Oh, and we all ate 3 red velvet heat cupcakes each :)

We're excited to see what Oklahoma and this stage in life have in store for us. It is extremely hot here, but we like it. Blaine even said he's getting used to it a little bit each day. I wear lots of skirts to let a breeze cool me off and Blaine always says that he's jealous of that. So he's been wearing his new OU basketball shorts everyday so he can have a breeze as well.

Spontaneous Movie Night

Another Friday night rolled around and we didn''t really have any plans. So after our homemade burgers and yummy yam fries, we decided to go mini-golfing since we have free passes. The bottom line of that is that Blaine won by one, but there was a questionable play on the first hole, so it could be just as accurate to say we tied...

Listen: We play sports. We like to win. Simple as that. We aren't those couples who act like, "we are so silly. we're just here to goof around and have fun. silly me, i'm horrible at hand eye coordination, ha ha ha ha ha." No thank you. On the other hand, though, we are also not the couple that doesn't speak for the rest of the night after a competitive date.

Anyways, on our drive home we passed UVU's baseball stadium where the minor league Orem Owlz play. On our way to mini-golf we noticed a game going on, but as we passed it on our ride back we noticed people laying in the outfield watching a movie on the jumbotron. So we spontaneously decided to pull over and go check it out. And since we always keep a couple of blankets in the trunk, we were all set. We walked into right-center, played down our blanket, and enjoyed high school musical under the stars... and stadium lights :)