Dreamy Hawaii Trip: Part 2

Wednesday we woke up bright and early and headed to Hanauma Bay, the most popular snorkel location in Hawaii. Unfortunately I don't have an underwater camera, but take my word for it, INCREDIBLE experience. We saw so many beautiful fish. My favorite is the black and white polka dot one with a fluorescent yellow stripe. Also, the humuhumunukunukuapua'a. Great little guy. Nemo, Dori, scar, and all their buddies are now residing in this bay as well.  

That evening we took family pictures. 

I sure do love these people

Dreamy Hawaii Trip: Part 1

We found out last Christmas that the whole Mortensen clan would be going to Hawaii! The wait from December 2013 to August 2014 was rough, but, most days, the anticipation was the only thing that got me through Spring and Summer classes. Needless to say, Monday morning at 3:30 I was extremely excited. The Delta flight attendant said, "woah, you are way too awake this morning." "I'm going to Hawaii!"

packing the car at 3:30 in the AM. WHAT!?

Hawaii airlines babay!

blurry plane selfie 

We stayed at this perfect condo on the Southwest side of Oahu. I forgot to get a picture! :( It was perfect for our stay! It had a full kitchen with all appliances. Our first stop was good ol' Costco to get groceries for the week. Costco is a great land. (Costco samples in Hawaii are the same as samples in Utah. In my mind they would be poi and coconut and fish. But, alas, jello and pretzel hot pocket thing.) 

magical pineapple. it's hawaii.

The kids stayed at the condo, while Steve's parents stayed at a hotel a few blocks away. Connected to this hotel were these lagoons. We spent the second day relaxing at the lagoons. Hello, horrible sun burn. on the second day. Apparently, when your skin hasn't seen the sun in a year a single application of SPF 50 is not good enough for this fair skinned girl.

Ko'olina Lagoon

Steve is swimming with two sea turtles in this picture. serious. 

I have the cutest nieces and nephews! 

Also, the cutest husband. 

That night we went out to a nice dinner and the gardens connected to the restaurant. It was a beautiful beginning to our trip!

I love my cute in-laws

These friends decided to hang out above my head at dinner. Thanks friends.

Primary President???

Steve and I currently go to church with a group of other newly married BYU students.  Our ward has about 25-30 couples in it during the summer and about 50 couples during the school year. I love our ward! It's really nice being around people who are all in similar life situations with similar life goals and problems. We have dinner and Family Night with different couples in our ward all the time and have been making some wonderful friends.

In my church we all have different jobs or callings. I was just released from my old calling as Relief Society Secretary. This was an awesome calling because I had the opportunity to get to know all the women in our ward better. I was also able to teach the women a couple times a year and help plan activities. I'm a little relieved and a little sad to not have this opportunity anymore. Today I accepted my new calling. A surprising calling. A calling that I'm sure will help me but I'm not totally sure what to do and how to do it in our unique ward. I am now the primary president of the Provo Utah Married Student 12th ward. (PUMS 12 if you will) The thing is no one in our ward has children. We have about 6 or 7 babies and quite a few pregnant women but no one in nursery or primary. I'm not sure how to feel about this, mostly just confused. Our bishop is convinced that we will have kids in the future. All in all I'm excited, confused, and eager to get to know more about the primary organization with or without kids to teach. :)

I'd love any advice about what makes a successful primary.  I want to learn as much as possible for that wonderful day when a child moves into our ward!

To learn more about the primary organization in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints click here.

RW MoveIt Summer Intensive

One of Utah's oldest and best dance companies is Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company. The last two weeks I was part of this company's summer intensive. It was an awesome experience. I'm so glad there are opportunities like this for dancer's to improve and learn more about the profession. We had modern and ballet technique classes, creative play (composition) class, and a collaborative repertory class. 

BYU dancers at the camp

My collaborative rep group
and the incredible professional dancers
Melissa and Brad! 

Dancers really are their own type of special. 

In the middle of the showing we had an audience interactive
movement time. 

 At the end of the two weeks we had a concert, showing all the collaborative works and student choreography. This is my groups piece. I am the one in purple and black. :)

I look forward to the workshop next year.

Steve (I'm a web developer) Mortensen!

 WARNING: I brag about my awesome husband a lot in this post. 

For the last three months Steve has been going to a web development boot camp. This was from 6-9 (let's be honest 9:30 or 9:45) Tuesday-Thursday and 9-2ish every Saturday, plus a couple hours of homework each week. Plus, his regular full time job. He has been a crazy busy guy! Even though I missed him a lot during the last three months, I am so proud of his accomplishments! 

Thursday was "Demo Night" for DevMountain which really just means a celebration and a chance to show off what they've learned with a final personal project. Steve was chosen to present his project on the big screen to the whole audience. OH YEAH! I was so nervous and excited for him that I didn't even think to take pictures during the quick presentation, but he did a great job showing his project, explaining the challenges, and discussing the successes. Of course, he made the audience laugh. His project is a video chat website using Polymer and WebRTC. The goal is to be able to tutor speakers of other languages through the website. I don't totally understand everything he has learned but I know he has learned JavaScript and the basics of other languages. 

 Every single person I met at Demo Night had great things to say about Steve. "Your husband is a rockstar!" "He's the best in our class!" "Steve always knew the right answer!" This was a little embarrassing for him but he was definitely beaming on the inside. The thing I am most excited about is that he loves development. He'll wake up in the morning and tell me about the dream he just had about programming...weird! Steve has found something that he is good at and loves which makes me so happy! There is still a lot to learn about programming but DevMountain was such a great beginning to this journey. His goal now is to get a development job so he can keep learning and practicing. He currently has 2 job offers and a couple potential offers. In the next couple days we will decide which job is the best fit for him.

So proud!