UPDATE

I have some great news. Really great news for me. I was invited by a professional, really good guitarist/songwriter who happens to be in my ward, to play with his band for an event in February. He wanted to know if I could read chord charts and sing harmonies. uh, yeeeeaaaahhhh, you bet I can! I was born to read chord charts and sing harmonies sir. :) ok Honestly, when I moved here, I never thought I'd be able to play like that again. I was sure of it. This gig is in Vegas (so I get to take the family) and is a concert for a Regional LDS Singles event where there are supposed to be 1500 people attending. We aren't playing for a dance or party, it will actually be a concert with people sitting in seats watching. We are the first night and David Osmond is the second night. Yikes. I am so excited! I get the song list today. Seriously I am happy about this. The interesting thing is, there will be someone playing the synthesizer and I will be keyboards. So, that means that on songs like Here Comes the Sun, which we get to do, I don't have to figure out how to play the strings, that flute/organ sound, etc. all at the same time. It will be really nice to divide all of those extra sounds up between two people. There will also be 3 guitars instead of one or two. I am excited to see how this goes.

I am excited about something else that happened yesterday. After six months of living in this house, the only major downside has been finding out that there is no heat or air conditioning in the 2nd house, which is where Maddie and Ali are. Luckily, we are in a temperate climate so the girls have been ok with space heaters, but about a month of summer is awful. Anyway, yesterday, a worker showed up to replace both. "Great!" I said. "Have at it!"

Since Sunday, Brett has lost 7 pounds. Seriously, he had swordfish delivered last night. It's actually working out great, because his workout at work starts at 5:30pm (an hour earlier than he usually leaves to come home) so he ends up coming home at the same time as before. He has more time in the mornings since he isn't exercising here.  Yesssss. The girls and I are doing well too, but just won't be as fast as Brett. I can tell a difference from what he is eating and what we are eating, although I'm trying. I made talapia fillets yesterday, but they had breadcrumbs and Brett reminded me that cereal, yogurt, breadcrumbs, any bread, are not as good as what he is getting which is no carbs at all--mostly veggies and fish, which is a little hard for me to do! How can we give up cereal? Blessed cold cereal, mother of all modern foods. I'm just not used to cooking that well yet.

Spence called about 2 hours ago and said, "Mom, guess what I'm doing tonight?" Hmmm, do I want to know? "I'm making fettucini alfredo for Michaela." Pause. Pause. "Okaaaaaay. How exactly are you going about that Spence?" He said that his friend Lindsey was actually "helping" him which stands for "actually doing all of the cooking while I joke around and tell her thank you so much. Anyway, should be interesting. I'll text him right now and see if he'll text me a picture this very second..

I did my visiting teaching (which always feels great) and went to the park today with a friend, an actual friend, a person who I actually talked to during the day and not on Sunday at church.  Finally, I get to go to book club tonight (which is thoroughly enjoyable as well.)

I am frantically finishing these...

I'm happy with them. Now I just have to figure out how to make the party appropriately monkey themed. (I'm too old for this. I run out of ideas) I was tempted to just hand her some money and call it good instead. I know I know! That would be such a bad mother moment if I did that. This is one year where Sydney needs a party and we need to invite girls from school and I need to meet their mothers. So MONKEY MANIA it is!