Kunz Krazies

Well, to follow up on the last post, I did find some gumption and finished my paper and exam. I have now heaved a sigh of relief and can begin on my hundreds of papers to grade. As a break from the madness, I to went to Kory's work Christmas party on Tuesday night. Melaleuca hires out the Civic Auditorium for a couple of nights and brings in some sort of entertainment. This year it was a comedian named Fred Keck--I think, or something like that. He was from Minnesota and very funny. A few weeks ago Kory called and said they like to have someone playing piano music while everyone is being seated and asked if I would be willing to play. I said, "Sure, as long as no one listens to me." So, I get there, thinking I'll be on an upright in the corner somewhere, and I behold this stage gorgeously decorated with lights and Christmas trees and this grand piano right in the spotlight, like I'm Jim Brickman or something. I immediately became a little more nervous. Luckily...

Okay, I've officially reached my end-of-semester slump, when, in spite of the mountains and mountains of grading I have to do, I stare into space, look on facebook, read the news, call my sisters, text Kory, do anything, ANYTHING, but what I need to do. I must snap out of this, because, on top of the grading, I have a paper and a take-home final to turn in on Thursday for my last--yes LAST--PhD course of my entire life. Provided I pass it, which seems a little iffy at the moment. I'm sure I will start to care sometime in the next two hours. It has to happen. Merry Christmas.

To explain the title, when something makes Ainsley feel sick, she says "That sickens me." For some reason that makes me laugh. I had to look the term up just to make sure, but it mostly means "to disgust," although its secondary meaning is to show the signs of an illness. So, in Ainsley's terms, this has been a sickening week. I started to get a sore throat on Monday afternoon, it got worse on Tuesday, Wednesday I woke up, planning to cancel class. I thought I needed to get a few things from my office, so I was heading over there right before 7:00 and noticed that all the lights in Rexburg appeared to be off. The power outage caused class cancellations, so I came right back home and vegged all day. Mom made me some soup, Dad cleared my driveway. Thursday I woke up feeling even worse, so I cancelled class again and skipped my meeting and my PhD class. I was thrilled to hear that our PhD class is not meeting again this semester and that the final is an open bo...

This was a memorable Thanksgiving--my first one away from my family since my mission. Kory and I loaded the kids up in a rented minivan and headed to St. George. Once we were there, we all split up to different houses--Kory has two sisters and parents there. The kids swam in the pool at their grandparents for awhile and then we went to his two sister's homes. The next morning Kory and I went for a walk and then took a drive to Hurricane to look for a retirement home. We found an awesome golf course. Unfortunately, we later found out that Hurricane is named after the winds that always blow there. I hate wind, so we'll have to find something else. As long as it's by a golf course, Kory is happy. :) We had dinner at Nicole's house. It was fun to hang out with Kory's family. I've met all of them before, but it was fun to visit more. We took a little trip to Swig--Nicole and Todd's business which is wildly popular in Utah. It's a drive through d...

I feel like I'm already on vacation--which is bad, because I have a lot of work to get done. But still.... Let's see. Wednesday Kory and I went to the temple with Austin and then took he and Leah to The Hickory. Kory and Austin tried the Big S burger--which is basically a hamburger between two cheese sandwiches. With bacon. It's hard to wrap your head around. And your mouth. On Friday we took the kids to the Festival of Trees, although when Kory saw how crowded it was, he said, "Okay, we're in and out in seven minutes." "Seven minutes?" I said. "Okay, you give us a time limit." "Twenty minutes." "Okay, thirteen." He drives a hard bargain. And I think we were pretty close to thirteen. It was wall to wall people so it wasn't that fun to look around. After that we went to the Pizza Pie Café and ate. We got home and watched the Two Towers. I was cuddled up with Kory on one side, Caleb on the other, and Chl...

This weekend, Kory and I took a roadtrip to Utah. A few hours before we were supposed to leave, he was given Jazz tickets by his employer. So, we made a stop at the Delta Center and watched the Jazz play the Spurs. It was fun!     We stayed with my friends Wendy and Bob that night. The next day we did some shopping, saw some of Kory's family, and then had a potluck with some of my old roommates and  their spouses at Wendy's house. My sister and her family came too. It was so fun to introduce Kory to them and visit with them all.   Kory sang a few songs for them. Gracie, my niece, kept saying, "Could you play one more?" And 3-year-old Hannah said, "When he sang my eyes started to water." They are such cute kids.     What a fun weekend. It felt great to get away from everything and just be together and to spend time with friends. We survived our first road trip with no fights.  I'd say he's a keeper. 

This page of notes from my PhD class pretty much sums up where my mind has been lately. Can't wait for this semester to be over, because I will be done with PhD classes--not my PhD. But no more homework. No more 2 1/2 hour classes on incredibly hard chairs. Sigh. I've also been thinking about things like this: Last weekend was fun. On Friday night, we went to dinner with friends. On Saturday, Kory came to stake conference with me. Since he's so busy with his ward, I haven't had a chance to introduce him to any of my Sugar City people. It was fun to have him there. We sat with my parents and later went to Dairy Queen, along with most of the rest of the stake. :) On Sunday we went to the Anderson's and Kory and his kids came too. The kids were busy doing a spook alley in the basement. Here's  Sam as Quasimodo:   On Monday I went to work and turned around and came home immediately because I was having severe stomach pain. I think it was som...

Well, Kory officially asked me to marry him last night. All of my friends and family have been joking about it, since I've basically got the wedding planned, but it doesn't feel official until you have the ring. I was trying to remember when we actually started talking about getting married. I think it was on September 14. We were just finishing dinner with his brother Josh and his wife and we got in the car and started talking. Then Kory said, "Let's face it, this is looking pretty good." And I agreed. And then we started talking about dates. Kory initially suggested August. August!!! Can you believe this man? I suggested April. Well, it only took him a few days to decide that April would be better. In fact, we always joke now, "Who was the idiot who ever suggested August!?" So, we figured out that Chloe would be baptized on the date that we had initially planned in April, so we started talking about moving it up. So our new date is February 15, as ...

So, I was on the phone with Kory the other day and he said, "What if your favorite author had a new book out and you could read the book OR read the book holding hands with me." Of course I took option B. Of course, that was Kory's lead in to asking me to come walk the golf course with him. So he can be in what he calls the Garden of Eden AKA the golf course, and have the pleasure of my company. I told him the book/golf analogy didn't totally work.  I was actually happy to join him and it was a perfect, crisp fall evening. I could golf if I wanted to, but I actually really just enjoy walking--always have. So, I just played caddy and gave him kisses when he got really good hits--and even if they weren't that good. :) It's actually fun to watch Kory do something he is super passionate about. Golf makes him super happy. And I think it's good therapy for him, so I'm all for it. We also had a fun weekend. On Saturday we, as Kory would say...

Had a great FHE night last night. We had pizza, the kids entertained me with some very interesting dances, then we loaded up and went to the pumpkin patch and got pumpkins. After that,  we delivered a pumpkin to all of Kory's home teaching families, went to Arctic Circle, returned home, and watched some Mormon Messages. Fun night!

Last night Kory and I took the kids to Leo's--a Chucky Cheese type place in I.F. I had heard of it, but never been there. They could rename it Germ-O-Rama, but the kids loved it. My favorite was when we all played laser tag. Love these team pictures, especially Kory's attempt at imitating Daniel Craig--notice the lip. What a fun bunch of people!

  Conference weekend was great, as usual. On Saturday morning I watched with the Andersons, which is always entertaining. That afternoon, I went to Kory's house and we watched the second session, followed by watching golf. :)   On Sunday, Kory and I went to Victor to his parent's house and watched with his brothers and their families, as well as a niece and her roommates from BYUI. It was great hanging with his family and we took a couple of walks and 4-wheeler rides into the mountains by their house. Victor and Teton Valley are so beautiful this time of year. Kory's sister-in-law had a great camera with her, taking pictures of her kids, so we had a little photo shoot. 

I have been dating Kory since June and I have to say there's never been a dull moment. Take last night for instance. We were going to go out on a date, but he remembered he had his kids that night, so I suggested we go to the straw maze. So, we took his two youngest kids and my niece to Arctic Circle for dinner, then headed to the straw maze. One thing a father of eight is good at is eating all the leftovers of his kids at restaurants. And he's not at all phased by germs. As we were heading into the maze, Caleb decided he didn't want to go--he thought it looked too creepy. So, Kory coaxed him in. Caleb said, "I think it might help if I thought about one of your songs"--since Kory writes songs. We followed the kids through the maze, stealing a few kisses when they rounded the turns ahead of us. About twenty minutes in, Chloe said, "I hate this. My legs hurt. When are we going to be done." Even Kory seemed to be getting a little worried that we...