Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Next year we will send out actual Christmas cards because of the following reasons:
1) I won't be finishing up my MFA like this year
2) We won't be in school (yahoo!)
3) Maybe we will be interesting enough to warrant a Christmas card/letter

2011 was an interesting year full of adventures and challenges.  We celebrated our first anniversary and went to  a whole bunch of weddings/receptions.  We went on an epic road trip with James' family to Nauvoo to see his sister and her husband and son get sealed in the temple.  It was a LOOOOONG trip but totally worth it!
James started his last year of grad school, he will spend next semester finishing his project and writing his thesis.  I know he'll do a great job! I finished my degree earlier this month, it was a lot of work but I'm really glad it's done.  Now I need to find a job.  Anyone hiring?  Ha ha.

We hope you all enjoy this Christmas season!  We are so grateful for  our Savior, Jesus Christ, and the blessings of the Gospel.

Merry Christmas!

James and Lindsay 

December, so far

As usual it has been COLD in Logan.  Not as snowy as usual but cold.  Here is some proof:

Lovely icicles connecting Tessie to the ground

And another picture

 Don't worry, it's just ice from the INSIDE of my windshield.  Did I mention it was cold?

I handed in my paperwork for graduation last week.  It was all so final and somewhat scary.

The blue paper is my binding reciept from the library for my Plan B report, I can pick it up after 2 PM January 17!

 Alex was set apart as a missionary on Tuesday night so we drove down for that.  It was great to see.

The grandparents Arbuckle with Elder Keller

My ridiculously good looking siblings

Elder Keller showing off his mad yo-yo skills

Me and my Keller grandparents.  I tried to get a picture with the Arbuckles but it didn't happen

My Dad with his parents

 We slept over so we could see Alley before he went to the MTC:

See you in 2 years!

 Some of the fruits of my education, a dress made in draping class and a mock-up from a paper patter I drafted off of a completed pattern.


I'm hoping that my dress looks more Modcloth than weirdo

 USU is producing "Pirates of Penzance" with the music department.  We borrowed several costumes from the Utah Shakespearean Festival (specifically the daughters costumes) and we need a few more.  Luckily out of the seven (?) costumes we borrowed, six fit the actresses so we only need to build four.  My job was to take a paper pattern off of the largest dress and then alter the pattern to fit the remaining actresses.  Our luck continued because the four girls were basically two sizes so I only needed to make two more patterns!  I wish I could be there to help make the other dresses.  I'll really miss working in the shop with my friends.

I think that's about it!  James took his only final today and I have to meet with my design studies professor sometime this week.  We're basically done!

Alex is a missionary!

My little brother Alex went to the MTC today.  He is going to be a missionary in the Mexico Veracruz mission.  I know he'll do a great job.

We love you Alley!

(The pictures were taken by one of his friends, McKay Bailey)

November in a nutshell

What a month!  

I defended my Plan B report, all 106 pages of it

The green square is my defense on the seminar room schedule

My printed report (for some reason the picture looks like it was at night)

 Later that day I narrated the Relief Society Thanksgiving dinner.  The cultural hall looked amazing!

I was grateful that when the needle shattered after hitting the pin that it didn't hit me in the eye.

The (almost deadly) pin

 Over the Thanksgiving weekend my brother Alex gave his farewell address.  He did a wonderful job.  We had a bunch of people over afterwards:

 After the crowd left we took some pictures as a family.  It will probably look different in two years!

The soon to be missionary:

 After that Hil and her family got ready to head back to Vegas.  We had some fun before they left though.

Ave with her grammy

 James and I helped my parents get the house ready for Christmas.  We figure that since we don't have a tree at our place, helping someone else put up a tree fills our quota.  Right?

And one last, random, picture.  This is prop storage at Utah State.  It looks like the room of requirements...

Did I mention that I have three sets of renderings to finish and then I'll be done?  I can't believe I'm so close to being done.  I'm very excited!

Phew!

It has been a busy semester.  We went to a wedding on Friday.  James's old roommate, Lonnie, married his girlfriend, Amber.  It was really sweet.  Here is a picture that James took from before the ceremony. 

I SWEAR I was wearing make-up...

I finished the dress I mentioned earlier.  While I worked on the dress, James made this:

 It's a pot holder.  My husband has skills

The finished dress, front:

 and back:

Oh, and I defended my Plan B Report on Wednesday.  I totally passed.  Now I need to finish my re-writes. But not right now.  It's waaaaay too late for that.

Do you ever feel like...

I'm halfway through my revisions of my Plan B Report in preparation for my defense on Wednesday.  So far it is 103 pages long.  As I have been working on the monster I've been thinking about next semester.  It's going to be a weird semester because for the first time since I was 5, I'm not going to be in school.  (I realize that I wasn't in school on my mission but it was kind of like school.)  I'm trying not to freak out.  It's a big deal to graduate and be DONE.  I'm planning on working next semester so I don't go crazy and so we can live comfortably.  As I have been casually job searching I feel like I have
  no skills.

I realize that's not totally true, I can make stuff.  Lots of stuff.  I know how to take a drawing of a costume and make it real: pattern and all.

But I don't have the skills to fulfill the jobs readily available.  It's kind of freaking me out.

That could also be the fact that it's 1 AM and I started working on my Plan B Report at...7?  I'm not sure.

Bedtime.  I'm sure about that one.

It's been a long day but another quick month

 The semester is drawing to a close at a frightening rate.  I am going to defend my Plan B report in less than a week and there are only four more weeks of the semester left.  What have I been up to?

I have been re-vamping my porfolio:

My renderings for The Nutcracker, I would LOVE to design it!

 Exploring new parts of campus as I get paperwork signed:

Some pretty leaves by one of the Engineering buildings

Working hard on projects in the shop.  This dressing gown is for 20th Century, opening December 1st.

I also put a dress together for one of my Mom's co-workers.  Her son is getting married and this is the dress she picked out from the pattern book at the fabric store.  It looks a lot better than I was expecting. Phew.

It's not done yet, I have a fitting with her on Saturday

 And, in a first for me:

Yep, a parking ticket.  Technically James got it but it was my car so... I'm glad it's only a $12 ticket.  I swear it was $25 or so at Weber.  Awesome.

Where did October go?

I am seriously confused about how fast October passed us by.  I remember General Conference and I remember handing in my Plan B draft...how is it already November?

I defend my Plan B Report in a week and a half.  I still haven't received any feedback from my committee.  Does that mean I don't have to do any re-writes?

I still do?  I thought so.

Happy Halloween!

I decided to dress up for my last Halloween in school.  I decided to be Margot Tenenbaum (from the movie The Royal Tenenbaums) because I had all of the elements I needed.  It would have been even better if the striped dress was a polo dress instead of a v-neck.  It's Halloween, not rocket science.

 Margot is the surley looking one in the fur coat.

And me:

I was just really glad that I inherited my great grandma's fur coat, it was the PERFECT color.

Fun fact: the striped dress was also from my great-grandma.  I have a picture of me as a baby and she's wearing the dress.

Margot has a fake finger and I wanted to pay homage to it:

I covered my finger in make-up primer then waterproof eye-liner followed by a dusting of eye shadow.  I washed it off after I took this picture during design studies.  It was smearing on things, I was just nervous.  And distracted.

I learned something this Halloween:
You should be something readily recognizable because otherwise you're just the weird girl wearing too much eyeliner, over heating in a fur coat.

James didn't dress up but next year he wants to go as a one armed guy riding a velociraptor.  The only problem is that the character in Jurassic Park that fits that description was played by Samuel L. Jackson.  Maybe we can figure out another, less questionable option.

I turned in my paperwork for my defense on the 16th.  I can't believe it's in two weeks!  I have just a few more tables and things to add in addition to the re-writes.  It's almost ready!

Kind of morbid but it's October...

First up, a picture of the cutest girl in the world in her dress.  It fit!  The picture is a little blurry but you get the idea.

 During fall break we went exploring around Cache valley.  We drove to Millville and visited the park.  At first I wasn't as thrilled about playing but it was really fun.

  James loves his domes...

We drove down through the other towns until the road stopped being paved.  We figured that if we kept driving we could have wound up in Morgan. (Actually we would have wound up in Huntsville.  Tomato, tomato.)

We stopped by the cemetary in Millville on our way home.  My great-great-grandparents:

And my great-grandparents.  They were some of my favorite people.  I wish James could have met them.

 On Sunday we continued on with the creepy cemetery tours and drove out to Newton.  My great-grandma Keller (Grandma great) grew up there.  This is her parent's headstone:

It was fun to explore the valley and the leaves were so pretty.  But apparently not pretty enough to deserve a picture or two.

We're doing well, more of the same.  On of my friends is pregnant...with TWINS.  It's intense.  I'm not sure if I could handle something like that. (Knock on wood.)

Fall Break!

Today is Fall Break, it's only one day but I am very glad to have it.  While my parents and youngest sister are in Vegas, we are at home, wishing we could be there.  I wish I could be there to see our niece's face when she opens her birthday present:

 

 It was my conference craft.  It might be here Halloween costume as well, she has said she wants to be Cinderella.  I'm excited for the time when I won't be in school and I will be able to make stuff like this for more little girls.  Seven more weeks of fun and then finals week.  I don't anticipate that I will have anything much to do except clean out my grad lab cubicle and my costume shop drawer.  It seems like I just moved in.  Weird.

Next up, an old post of a DELICIOUS dinner.  Sourdough bruscetta with fresh tomatoes and mozzarella:

We had purchased a bunch of sourdough loaves with one of our Bountiful Baskets and figured we shouldn't let it go bad.  It was so good!  I diced the tomatoes and then mixed in some basil and garlic.  While that was marinating I pre-toasted the bread sliced in a frying pan.  After that I layered some cheese and piled the tomatoes high!  It was SO GOOD!  I think we should have a tomato plant or two in our next place.

In terms of our lives, James is working on his thesis project in the water lab.  He's collecting data from his soil waste-water columns and this is what they look like:

It's pretty cool.

Here is my current layout for my Plan B Report.

  I still need to include bibliographies, tables of contents, acknowledgements...that sort of thing.  It doesn't look as impressive on the screen but once you hold 85 printed pages in your hands, it does.  I defend it in 3 1/2 weeks.  Wish me luck!

Proof Production Photos!

Here are the production photos for Proof.  They are in show order so if you look at the pictures, you've seen the show.  It was a great last production to design and I'm very proud of my work.  If you would like to see the renderings as well, click on my portfolio button or just click here.

Set design: Milinda Weeks

Lighting Design: Bruce Duerden

Costume Design: Lindsay Beardall

Directed by Adrianne Moore

Cast: Felicia Stehmeier as Catherine, Kent Hadfield as Robert, Nikki Baum as Claire and Adam Earl as Hal.

 We enjoyed a wonderful dinner tonight with James' friends, the Eraslans.  They are a Swiss family from Winterthur he met on his mission.  We're lucky they have been coming to visit every year.  Some time soon we hope to return the favor.