Whirlwind Whimsical Wedding Weekend (AKA: "The Bittersweet")

Well, it happened. Believe it or not. Krista got married. The day was filled with smiles, laughter, tears, joy, bittersweet-ness, pulled pork, window markers, crying children, downpours, umbrellas, chocolate nuggets, slideshows, seeing old friends (some happy to see, and some not so much, haha), tarantulas, space heaters, anxious in-laws, cuddling, brownies, bouquets (which I didn't catch... because it didn't get thrown haha), and just utter bliss. By the end of this weekend, I felt like I had gone through every single human emotion that existed. It was exhausting, but just happy at the same time.

A fore word: this picture is a summary of my life for the last 6 months (Don't take this too seriously, just laugh, because it makes me laugh too)(also, after I've written this, I've realized the foreword is really long, so you're more than welcome to skip to part two. I'll put it in bold.

For those of you who don't watch the TV show House, this is a still of House (the main character) (left), Wilson (center), and his girlfriend Sam (right). House is a single, sarcastic, old man, and he and Wilson have been roommates/best friends for like... EVER. And now Wilson is dating Sam and is going to ask Sam to marry him. So House is kind of having a rough life right now. And yes, House and Wilson are last names. I don't know why they don't go by their first names. 

Pretty much, Kris and I have been best friends for the past three years. And/or married. So when a BOY walked into her life, I was not so happy. Actually that's not true. I was pretty sure he was going to get botched, because Krista had a mission call, and this is typically what happens to boys that try to schnike Krista when she is up to something. So it was pretty chill until I saw that it was actually going somewhere... Then things got a lil cray cray. 

Anyway, Billy and Krista began dating. Maybe a week after she got her mission call I realized that she was definitely NOT going on a mission, haha. I was undecided about how I felt about it. I mean, Krista was MY best friend. And all of a sudden some boy is taking up all our time? What the heck is that all about? 

That summer I went to California for about a month, just cause I needed to go "find myself" (See this blogpost for how that all went down.). Emotional crises and identity moratorium were daily part of my thought process. I was experiencing a long confusing period of heartache, and I had three roommates who all had significant others, so I was a little bit anti-love at that point (ha). So I drove off by myself to beautiful, Carlsbad, California. While I was there, Krista and I talked a couple of times, and she sent me a letter just saying how she was doing, what she was up to, etc. etc. Kris was so good to me, because she knew that I was very sensitive to all things PDA, love talk, and relationships. But she did mention: "One thing I know for sure: I LOVE Billy Hiatt and I want to marry him!" That's when I knew for sure it was going to happen. Krista doesn't just throw these things out. She and I knew it way late (in comparison to Billy... who knew like on the first date), but we knew it. One question burned in my mind: Who the heck was this Billy Hiatt guy??

Eventually I had to come back to Provo for Summer's wedding, and to earn money since I just escaped my life for about a month. I was determined to find out who this Billy Hiatt was and make sure he was worthy of marrying my best friend! That weekend, bum got married and there was Roy-family bonding including snails, pizza, noodles, lingerie, mattresses, Dark Knight movie nights, nail painting and joy. I was so happy to be welcomed to this intimate family gathering and bond with people that I loved so much. I love the Roy family! They are my second family. The weekend was great. It hit harder to me what Krista was about to go through when bum walked out of the temple and it freaked me out haha. 

Anyway, I started slowly getting to know Billy Hiatt. From the outside he kind of seems like a punk. If you facebook stalk him (as me and Krista used to do often), he is into planking, mohawks, sticking his tongue out in pictures, and dirt biking. But I was impressed with his . He was nicer to me than Krista was sometimes haha. He's like a pineapple. Hard and spiky on the outside, and the insides you can put on pizza. Just kidding, sweet and gushy on the inside. However, I still kind of was bitter for stealing my best friend.

And then they got engaged... blah blah blah. You can read about that here. 

There were some rough things that happened between then and the wedding. A hard death in the Roy-Hiatt family made for several tearful conversations between me and Kris. Through these conversations I really came to know how much love Krista had for Billy, because she was literally willing to do anything for him. She told me once that our friendship had meant so much to her more than ever, because she tried to model her and Billy's relationship after our friendship. That was probably the best compliment I've ever received in my life! Many times Krista was over at my house doing her laundry, sleeping on my couch, and I knew that we could still be friends after she got married. So it started getting easier. 

The crowning moment of it all is probably when I interviewed Billy for Krista's bridal shower. I asked him about 40 questions about his and Krista's relationship for the Newlywed Game, and filmed then. I want to like... post one of them on here, but I feel like Krista might think thats not cool so I won't. haha. But without giving you an example, I will just say that I really felt how much Billy loved Krista! He said such tender kind things, and he really knew her. I had my doubts, but they have really grown together and know each other on a deep level. Anyway... Bridal shower = great. One week later, it was wedding time!

Now that I've finished the "foreword..." which ended up being really long... Let's get to the actual wedding weekend. 

Part 2

The wedding.

Thursday, October 11th:

At around 7, we headed up to Billy's house with a car full of food, drove up to the cabin Sundance and had some good ol' rotisserie chicken for dinner. And sunny D! Everyone was up there- Lindes, Carters, Perez's, Willis's, Roys, Sister Roy's grandparents, nieces, nephews, BRENDA, and me! It was quite the party. The kids went to bed, and the sisters, me & brenda went down to the basement to paint our nails and open lingerie presents. The Roy sisters are looopy! I headed upstairs to make stickers for the chocolate nuggets for the reception while the sisters had the "talk". Eventually, we went upstairs, Jamie was curling hair at 1 in the morning, Brenda was sleeping on the floor, and Aly was CRACKING up at everything anyone said. (Don't worry, we picked up Brenda and put her in a bed). Me and Kris hopped in bed (For the last time!), and she kicked me all night... so I don't think I'll miss slumber parties too much haha. A word on the Roy grandparents: they are SO GREAT. They TOTALLY remembered who I was and were so happy to see me- HA!

Friday, October 12th:

We all woke up in a scramble. People were running around like CRAZY. All the hair that Jamie curled the night before had gone flat, so she curled like 4 people's hair. She's a CHAMP. Children were eating "marshmallow cereal," Krista was just kind of skipping around, LaDon was... sleeping... We were all getting dressed in our brown-and-carolina blue outfits, etc. Outside it was sprinkling. We had arrived last night in the  dark, so we didn't know what it looked like outside. AUTUMN WONDERLAND. Fall leaves everywhere, gray skies and sweeping long roads and driveways. It was beautiful. Krista and the parents left 3 hours early (which is a good thing because Krista forgot her marriage license at home so Brother Roy had to quickly drive to provo and get it). Eventually the rest of us packed up and drove to the temple. The Linde kids were asleep so I chilled in the car with them while everyone else went inside the foyer. While Aly and Daniel were sleeping I wrote Kris an email because she was getting married at that very moment!! When the little buggins woke up we slowly walked to the temple because they were quite slow and I could not carry both of them. It was pouring outside and all of us were soaked by the time we got to the temple. We chilled in the foyer until all the Roys came out, and we were laughing and having a good time and the temple people were probably mad at us because we were so loud haha. Finally, we all went outside to wait for the newlyweds!! We all gathered around the entrance, and because the temple was under construction, there was only one open entrance and people kept going in and out to do temple sessions and I was freaking out because what if they were walking in the same time Kris & Billy were walking out and they ruined all the pictures. But they didn't, so it was fine. Eventually they came out and it was bliss! They are such weird hooligans haha. I hugged Krista and immediately started bawling. I don't know why exactly, but don't worry, it was only the first time of like 7 times that I cried that day. Every bittersweet feeling I had ever had about my best friend getting married simply turned to utter joy. I was SO happy! Because she was so happy! I hugged Billy too and he gave me this weird grin... whatever haha. And all the little children went up and hugged them and it was cute I guess, but the point was, they were married!! (Some good pics) They started taking pictures and I got to hold up the back of Krista's dress cause the ground was wet and gross, so if you see a picture of all the family members on the temple steps, I am in that picture crouching like a gremlin behind Krista holding up her dress haha. Eventually, screaming crying children forced us to leave the temple as Billy and Krista went to take their pictures on the temple grounds. And then it REALLY started pouring. We all headed to the church where the luncheon was going to be at... yada yada yada, ate food, Krista's brother-in-law LaDon bowled over their poor aged grandmother (which prompted the modified-version-Christmas-song rendition of "Grandma got run over by LaDon!"), Andy spun kids around like airplanes, I chased kids with feather dusters, we ate ridiculously good brownies, and I got to talk to Bruce Newbold, his wife and his daughter who all know my mom's side of the family in California. Then we all drove to the Hiatt's house to get ready for the reception... I didn't know this about the roys, but they have some weird fascination with wrapping stickers around chocolate nuggets for receptions. Go figure. I mean it was fun, but it wasn't THAT fun? Me and Krista took a nap on the couch with CharlyAnn, and then we left to go set up for the reception!

IT WAS SO BEAUTIFUL. It was at Billy's uncles backyard in Lindon, and it was so pretty! I got to set up one of my projectors and speakers to play the slideshow that CJ and Eric made, with Billy's weird mexican music, and I ran into so many dear friends (and some not so dear- haha!). We ate pulled pork sandwiches and tons of candy, and all got wet in the rain. And I wrote some good embarrassing stuff on the back of Billy's truck which I won't repeat here. The most tender part of the whole night was when Krista & Billy were leaving. And we just kinda saw each other, and looked at each other for awhile, and Krista started CRYING. If you know Krista like I know Krista, Krista does not CRY. like EVER. She's not an emotional person, but one thing that will almost certainly make me cry is if my best friend, a non-emotional person, is crying. So I started crying, and we were crying, and hugging, and smiling, and Billy was probably thinking "craaaazy" and I was just SO HAPPY! Contrary to what I thought I would be feeling before, seeing my best friend getting married, and seeing her so happy, did not make me feel sad about not getting to be around her so much, but it just brought me great joy and hope for her future and for mine. I love Krista! And I love that she is married, because she is so happy, and I am so happy for her!  Everything else that happened that weekend is  of lesser importance. I went back up to sundance and had such a tender conversation with CJ and Char, whom I look up to as older sisters, since I had none. They promised to give me "the talk" before I get married - haaaha. That'll be good. Went bowling with Brig, Aaron S., Wendy, and Aaron G, had brownies with Rach and Chels,

OH YEAH, I forgot about this part- Brig & Aaron, and everyone else threw me a surprise birthday party!! Did not even see it coming. We were planning on just going to Aaron's house up in South Jordan, but it turned out being a surprise party with me, complete with pizza and cake, and a cool homemade banner, haha. I have the best friends ever! We had crazy fun playing pool and ping pong and basketball and who knows what kind of shenanigans... eating streamers and singing T swift really loud? At dinner they all went around the table and said what their favorite memory of me was. This is more precious than any present I've ever gotten!

Anyway, that's really it. My story of the events of October 12th. And before. And after, haha. 

Summary: I have been so blessed to have these people be in my lives. They have all touched my life for good, and will always be dear to me in my heart, even though life has us grow older, and apart. 

California!

Once upon a time I went to California with my 2 best friends! And it was so great!

Our friend Conner got home from his mission and Aaron, Brig, and I decided it would be fun to go down to LA and do some hooliganizing while going to his homecoming. BEST DECISION EVER. But soon we decided that it might not be a good idea, and I wasn't sure if I would get to use my car... so the trip was canceled. On Brig's birthday I found out that my car was indeed available so Aaron and I made this for Brig for him to open on his birthday and we surprised him! SCHNIKE!

Friday was the worst day ever, as I had to go get my car fixed, and get it lubed, and then take my last final. I accidentally grabbed the wrong textbook to study with, so I didn't study, had to take the test, botched it, got a parking ticket, lost my apartment key and got locked out for 30 minutes, and then my dad called telling me I needed to take Rachel's car instead, which also needed to be lubed, (this happened 1 hour before we were supposed to leave). So I hurried to jiffy lube, got it fixed, packed, and then we headed up to Bountiful for Rachel Jackson's wedding reception... which was completely in the dark because the electricity went out. It was great to see everyone, and then we ran to get Wendy's with Kris & Billy. At this point it was snowing pretty hard, but we took no heed! We left around nine, and hit 4 different snow storms where we had to go less than half the speed limit, which was pretty miserable. At 2 am, Aaron and I switched, and he drove until we got to beautiful California!! (Brig just slept the whole time)

CALIFORNIA!! Never in my life had I been so excited to get to that warm, sunny, beachful, blissful, second home of mine! Finals were over, and in a few days I was headed home! We got to Grandma Layne's house and all just passed out. Around noon we headed down to the San Diego Zoo! It was so cool! My favorite was probably the 4 inch pygmy marmoset. TOTES PRESH. Other highlights: there was a monkey that came right up to the glass to look at us, and as soon as the next people came over, it ran away! Me and Brig were looking at a lion, when I said "Last time I came to this zoo, there was an old lady with a walker, and the lion turned around and peed all over her" Knock on wood. The lion then proceeded to turn around, and spray... I screamed (although not as loud as Brig) and we both bolted and just barely got out of range before it relieved its waters. So, the zoo was great.

 

That night, Grandma took us out for Mexican, gave us flirting tips, we visited the Sheermans, and we all passed out while watching Home Alone. 

Sunday arrived!! We got up semi-early and drove up to Manhattan Beach, stopping in Redondo Beach to meet up with one of Brig's old investigators. We were reunited with Conner Gillette! We surprised him! Except, Brig was in the bathroom when Conner found us, so we had Conner hide and surprise Brig after he came out. Which he wasn't too happy about. Conner's talk was KILLER, and then we all headed back to his house for some Hawaiian Haystacks and socializing. And a bird pooped on Aaron.

(Preston Hatch - Aaron Gillette - Me - Conner Gillette - Brig - Aaron - Dallin Gillette)

That night we hit up a cemetery in Simi Valley and the Los Angeles Temple & Visitors Center. They had a sweet collection of international nativities. I found one from Africa, Brig found one from Thailand, and Aaron found a navajo one. 

We stayed at Grandpa Layne's house that night in Santa Ana. Sunday night would have been boring, but it wasn't, because we just stayed up joking and laughing with each other! Brig and Aaron are hilarious boys! I never am bored when I am with them and we always have so much fun! I have been blessed with hilarious, caring, and good natured friends!

DAY 3: We (And when I say we, I mean I) made a bunch of pancakes and fed the Russells, and then we headed up to the LA Science Center: biggest waste of money ever haha. We hit up the traveling Cleopatra exhibit which I thought was pretty interesting but Brig & Aaron thought it was really stupid. We also learned what an asp was, and where it bit Cleopatra. Aaron and I fell asleep in the IMAX movie about Egypt that we saw, and we ate a bunch of fruit snacks. Afterwards, we made a quick trip to China town where it smelled like urine and old people. Brig used his haggling skills to buy a weird panda scarf, and we didn't eat any eggrolls.

After getting back to Santa Ana, we hit up Downtown Disney, stayed a long time in the LEGO store, saw the fireworks, and then saw Wreck-it-Ralph! (And stole some 3D glasses out of the recycle bin)

And then took pictures of ourselves brushing our teeth...

DAY 4: We woke up, packed up the car and headed straight to Huntington Beach! It was SO COLD. Some highlights: This guy came up and asked if we could take a picture of him in the ocean, and he saw that I was wearing a BYU shirt, and it turns out he was Mormon! Kinda cool. I got to fly my super cool kite that I bought in San Diego this summer! Except for a seagull got caught in it at one point which was kind of sad/ funny. I dropped my iPhone in the ocean, and it lived! We ate a bunch of nacho doritos! And Aaron and Brig got to go to the beach on the west coast for the first time EVER! 

And then we left for home, where it snowed SO MUCH. Also, Aaron and Brig found this weird waterfall urinal at some random gas station in the middle of nowhere. 

And here are some good pics of them sleeping

In summary, 3 college students took a weekend trip to California, went to the zoo, the beach, and a children's science museum, drank kool-aid bursts, ate fruit snacks, and went to church. There was no drinking, no partying, no frisky-behavior, and no drugs. I'm pretty sure if I told that to anyone outside the BYU community they probably wouldn't believe me. 

And it was the best time EVER. 

Rough.

Rough weekend.

The past couple of months have been some of the most spiritually stagnant months I've ever lived. I don't like it. There has been bitterness in my soul, heartbreak, doubts, frustration, hurt, loneliness and loss. And the past couple of weeks I've really tried to start the uphill climb back on my way to doing better at everything I've been kind of slacking off on... scriptures, prayer, temple attendance, etc. And I feel a lot better. But I think HF is just wanting to make sure I'm serious about it, because this weekend was ROUGH.

Three semi-minor car bumps/accidents, family squabbles, sickness, physical pain, awkward moments, reflection of  things lost, and heartbreak reprisals. Just plain discouragement. Questions bouncing around through my mind, Why does there have to be contention here? What's the problem? Is it really supposed to take this long to get over someone? Am I really that incompetent of a driver? WHY AM I SICK WHEN I GOT THE STUPID FLU SHOT?! Why didn't I get this job- didn't I do my best? How am I going to pass this class? Why can't I stay awake through this class? I really need to learn the material! Haven't I been doing better with my scriptures and prayers? What am I not doing right?

Yet in these really hard moments there have been little shining reminder moments. The biggest is probably that I am alive and unharmed; as is my car for the most part. Good friends, providentially timed conference talks and scriptures. Devotionals, testimonies, christmas lights, ice cream, cafe rio, 17 miracles, hugs, smiles, and sweet, sweet memories of beloved relatives. Life could be better, but then again it could also be much, much worse.