USU Basketball

Throughout my collegiate career, I was often found at a ridiculous amount of BYU athletic events. Football, Basketball, Soccer, Lacrosse, Rugby, Volleyball, Track&Field... you name it, I probably went to at least 1 event if not more. I had the "superfan" tee's and always purchased the annually increasing All-Sports Passes. Even as a college grad, I still LOVE to watch college sports.

Now that I've resided in Logan for nearly 2 years, I had my first USU Basketball experience this last weekend. It was like nothing I'd been to before. I was so giddy that I laughed throughout most of the game. Ask Natalie~ she sat next to me and I'm sure my laugh was exhausting her and everyone around me.

So, the reason why this was such a different experience from those I had at my alma mater...

the students are C-R-A-Z-Y! Meet Wild Bill. This guy has been featured on ESPN multiple times. He's awesome.

And I loved it.

There were a slew of fine students on the front row of the students section who completely took command of the building. At the end, they were even able to silence everyone in a matter of seconds. Unbelievable. They also bring a white board with them to taunt specific messages to the bench/opposing team.

Plus, the cheers are in perfect unison. A few of the chants they were yell:

*I Believe That We Will Win* at the beginning of every home game.

(Not my video, but thanks to YouTube, there are great videos of their chants)

*Stupid, Stupid, Stupid*

*Take His Whistle*

*You, you, you, you, (lots of you's) Yooooooouuuuuuuu....Suck*

*Airball*

*Left, Right, Left, Right* (Whenever someone fouls out and walks back to the bench)

*Winning Team, Losing Team* (... repeat)

USU Basketball has a great record! 2 losses. I'm still all about BYU athletics, but I just had to shout out to USU and their fans. Good work!

We had a great time with Natalie and Matt! They had us over for dinner beforehand (yummy Pizza's by Nat), Sub-zero ice cream and then sweet seats at the BB game (thanks to Matt's family's season tickets). Love these guys.

With all this being said....

Go BYU! They play SDSU tonight. Both are top 10! Just sayin.

First Trip of 2011

Our first trip in this year was to Colorado. It was a little bit longer than most of our other trips: We had all day Thursday, Friday, Saturday and even part of Sunday. Our trips are usually shorter than that by at least 24 hours.

We got into town early Thursday, so we were able to do the usual family lunch with my grandparents, some uncles, some siblings and even some babies. Love that. Plus, we went to Qdoba. Delish. With some time to kill, we went to Nordys and then to my parents house to babysit the twins while Emily was teaching piano lessons to Mya and Peyton. They are so adorbale. The whole weekend, I was trying to get Cruz to walk. He's so close! Ella... not quite so close. Her little feet are teensy weentsy. So precious; when you stand her up, she just sort of dances in place.

Anyway, after babysitting, my parents and Collin & I went to Woodys Wings (now Wingman, but will always be Woodys in my book) for dinner. There is no place like Woodys. If only it came to Logan (not a chance). Some other college friends, Paul and Rachel Sabey, knew that we were coming to town. Paul now works for Kroenke at the Pepsi Center. They GAVE us 4 tickets to the Avalanche game! I was SO excited. Like a little kid. Collin had never been before, and even though the Av's lost, and didn't score, it was such a blast to be back in the Arena. Seriously, my favorite. Plus, the seats were fabulous. Club Level~ we ordered dessert after the 2nd period. Yes. ORDERED. And they brought it to us within 5 minutes. That's Service right there. Thanks Paul&Rachel! We had such a great time, and you guys are so awesome to give us the tickets!

Friday, Saturday and Sunday, we spent altogether with the family in Breckenridge. We played games, did a puzzle (Collin dominated that thing.. he's so good at it), the kids (big and small) played in the snow, a group went skiing/snowboarding, and Jen&Dustin even brought their snowmobile. The kids loved it. We had a great time.

My mom even snagged the idea to do a shrimp boil! 2 of my sisters bought my dad a turkey fryer for Christmas ans so this is one of the things they like to do with it. It was pretty yummy. Sorta crazy to dump all the food across the table and not use any plates or utensils, but afterwards, it was perfect.

It went by way too fast and we wish we could have stayed longer. We're grateful we could take some time off of work and be with family in Colorado. Hopefully it made up for our absence during Christmas. We can't wait to visit again.

Half

MARATHON! I've decided, officially, that I'm going to do a 1/2 Marathon. No, I haven't yet registered. I just checked out the calendar on utahrunning.com and I think I'm going to register for the Salt Lake City one. Their cause is Cancer, which is notable. I appreciate that. If I'm going to fork out $50-$80 to run 13.5 miles (hopefully), it might as well go toward a good cause.

Anyway... I would like to know if any of my devout readers (haha... thats a funny thought) have run a half marathon in Utah, or even if you've heard of a sweet race that you'd recommend. Gracias~

2011

Well, we're already a few days into the new year, and I have enjoyed the many resolutions people are making and also about the ones that they kept from last year. 2010 was one of the first times I legitimately accomplished a resolution throughout the entire year.

No Soda! Consider it a life change.

I used to be obsessed with Diet Dr. Pepper and trips to the Crest (if you've lived in Provo, you KNOW what I'm talking about). They had the best fountain drinks with that yummy taco bell/sonic ice. With a drive-thru!!! Are you kidding me? I'll take 2, and I'll be back for more later, thanks!

Anyway, Collin made this promise to an old roommate who was not L.D.S. that he would stop drinking soda if his roommate would stop drinking coffee/smoking/whathaveyou. He's running on 8 years of no soda or something crazy like that. Since C doesn't drink the good stuff (aka DDP or the like) it made it super easy to cut it out of my diet. I went an entire year without drinking it, so now that I've made it this far, there's really no point in starting back up again. Now I go grab my eco-friendly water bottle instead and fill up eighteen times a day! (This is seriously the one I have... thank you google images for finding it for me.) So boo-ya New Years Resolution 2010. One of them at least. I feel great about the exercise I did as well. I ran more in 2010 than I did in any other year of my life... I think. Started training for Ragnar with a 4th of July 5K in Island Park, and then came the real thing in October. Seriously, the funnest, most rigorous workout day(s) of my life. We were so sore, it's actually hilarious to look back on. We have such awesome friends that all the fun we had compensated for the muscle atrophe. Kinda. As for the candy and service... I kinda blew it on these 2 resolutions. I lasted the first 3 months of the year without any candy, and I didn't have any cavities last year because of it (I think)... we'll see how this year goes. And I meant to get involved with the Latin community and do some service. I could come up with a million excuses, but none of them are good enough.

New Years Resolutions for 2011?

(drum roll please)

*Keep going to the gym/back into Spin classes

(aka trim down more)

*Run. Run. Run.

(sign up for another race or 2.. maybe a half marathon or another Ragnar)

*Serve

(do what I meant to do last year)

*Eat Healthier

(not all the time, but just be more conscious)

*Get promoted/work hard and feel good about it

We'll see how they go....

Christmas 2010 Highlights

An Island Park Christmas Tree

Collin went to Idaho with his Dad and a few brothers-in-law. Brother-in-laws. Whatever. Anyway, they went up there and legally, with a permit, chopped down a couple trees for Christmas this year. Being our 2nd Christmas, and having just upgraded into a normal-sized-ceiling home, we could actually get a good sized tree this year. We also got a bunch of old ornaments from Collin's childhood. Love them.

Couples Christmas Party

We were able to get together with a few of our friends. Cory and Bree hosted this time at her grandparents house in Bountiful. It was so much fun to get gussied up, have a nice yummy meal and play games together. We are so blessed to have such wonderful people in our lives and to be able to spend time with them during the holidays. Love our friends! :)

Nostalgic Anniversary

Exactly 2 years ago, on Christmas day, Collin flew to Colorado to propose. Such a surprise~ I loved looking back on this post and reliving all of those great feelings and emotions. He's always so thoughtful and I am so grateful for that Christmas day back in '08. (That sounds like it was so long ago... we're totally veterans haha...) Anyway, I love Christmas because I get to spend it with my sweet hubs.

A Rothey Christmas

So, 2 years ago, the above happened, and then last year we spent the holidays in Colorado with my family (Collin's parents were in Africa on their mission, so we didn't have to flip a coin or anything to choose one way or the other). This year, we stayed in Utah and headed to Layton with most of Collin's family there. It was fun to see the similarities and differences between our family traditions. We had a great weekend with them. Luckily, we'll be able to spend some time in Colorado next week, also.

Gift-giving

Collin is seriously the best gift-giver. He doesn't like suggestions or hints, and just does his own thing. I love it, because I'm totally surprised and never expect anything. This year was no different. He completely out-did himself. Love that guy. We're also super lucky to have such generous parents and grandparents. They showered us with love and gifts. We're so grateful! My mom did an amazing job creating a book for my Grandpa Lee. She compiled letters from everyone in the family addressed to him, put them in a book with pictures and it is AMAZING! Love it. She also made an awesome bracelet with some of my Grandma Shirley's old earrings. LOVE it! :)

Christmas

I love this holiday. It's a great time of year to reflect on our lives and realize how blessed we are. I'm so grateful for my Savior, Jesus Christ! For his birth. His life. His example. His Sacrifice. His love. He is the reason for the season!

Christmas Card

We didn't do a Christmas Card or a Christmas Letter this year. There isn't a whole lot to report that everyone doesn't already know. Hence, no fun envelop to open from the Rothey's. Anyway, I just saw a pic that was taken of us (we hardly have any good ones of just the 2 of us) on Thanksgiving. So...

Merry Christmas

Love,

The Rothey's

Shout Out...

I have very talented friends. Kristy Denney and Brooke (Thulin) Bakken are incredible people and have impacted my life immensely and I love them mucho.

ANYWAY...

Kristy is a genius in the kitchen. She is always coming up with all these wonderful treats and such. Lucky for us, she is public and shares with the rest of us. She has even been featured on a rather reputable cooking blog (also happens to be her sis-in-law). So, if you'd like some ideas or just want to see the concoctions from a bff... here you go:

sweettreatsandmore.blogspot.com

As for Mrs. Bakken, she is an up and coming photog and she rocks. She has always had an eye for taking photos, and while we were roomies at BYU, I was always amazed by the great pics she'd take. So if you haven't seen her photos yet, you should go take a peak. She's taken shoots of 2 people very close to me. The Denneys (yes, the Kristy listed above) and the Griffins. So... go check it out. She's pretty much amazing.

Brookebphotography.blogspot.com

What can I say? I'm proud of my friends!!

Booked!!

The flight to Colorado is booked. Although we don't get to spend the holidays in CO, we are able to go visit the 2nd wknd of January before Collins semester starts. I am SO excited! We finally figured out when we could take a few days off of work, so we made the plans a little more concrete with booking our flight. I was facebook chatting with my dad, which I totally love that my parents are "with it" when it comes to technology... and everything. Such a hip couple! Anyway, I'm chatting with the padre and we start talking about Christmas. It hadn't really hit me until then that it was my first Christmas away from home. He said it made him tear up just thinking about it. A few days later I was talking to my mom on the phone about how sweet my dad is and this little experience and SHE starts tearing up too. During both instances, of course, I was reduced to tears too. I have such sweet family and I'll miss them for Christmas. Don't get me wrong, I am so excited Collins parents are back from their mission and that we get to spend the holidays with them again. It just takes getting used to, thats all. And even though it's after December is over, I'm still so excited to go see my family in Colorado. Anyway... I love my family. I love my in-laws. I love my husband. I love Christmas.

Thanksgiving and such...

Thanksgiving was wonderful this year. We hung out with all the Rotheys as much as we could. Whitney and Jake (the only sibs who live outside of Utah) were in town for a while for the holiday and the Rothey Homecoming. It was great to get everyone together. Lou and Jeri gave amazing talks at their homecoming as well. Such great examples. Here are the kids and grandkids. There were 36 of us all together, I think.

Same weekend, Brooke, Michael and Brady were sealed at the Salt Lake temple. What an amazing experience it was to be there. I'm grateful for Brooke's friendship and all she's taught me. And I'm so happy for her cute family and their new steps they've taken together.

All in all, it was a fantastic weekend, full of great memories.

FYI:

5:30am

M/F Turbo

is still on the schedule!!

Hallelujah!!!