Merry Christmas to me!

No matter how Lance tries he cannot keep a gift from me until the holiday that its meant for. Last year I got my Christmas present in November, my birthday present in February, and I just got my Christmas present today! In all fairness he really did try to keep this gift from me. We were at the mall last Sat. and there was a snowboard bag that I really wanted. Well I already have a snowboard bag but Lance didn't. He was going to buy it for me right then and there but I wanted to make sure his board would fit into the bag I already had so we would both have good bags. So his board fit, and he went back today to get me the new bag. He called me in a fit and told me that they were sold out of that color so I would have to wait. I was sad but would have gotten over it. Then this evening He was getting something out of the closet in the spare room and I heard him struggling. So I went in to help and up on the top shelf was a Zumies bag. What do you think was in it. I made a little squeal and he said, "NOO!" Oh well. I didn't want to wait anyway.

Here is a close up of the fabric. It looks pink and brown but its really purple and black. My two favorite colors.

Thanks Lance!  I love it!

HIKING

The other day Lance and I went hiking. We first went to Mesa Falls. I've been there before but it was in the spring so I had to hike in through 7 miles of snow. This time was alot easier. The cool thing about the falls is the spray creates its own mini ecosystem. You can kind of see the super green area at the bottom of the falls. I like sciencey stuff so I think thats kind of cool.

It was a paved track all the way down and then nice wooden decks and walkways. Here's Lance admiring the falls.

After we left Mesa Falls we went a little farther north to Island Park and went on a small hike at the mouth of Box Canyon.

Look how daring I am standing on a high cliff ledge. 

The weather was great. I even put on my jacket half way through. 

Don't worry we didn't just pose for pictures we actually did work too.

All in all it was a fun day.

Our New Place.

We really like our new place in Rexburg. It was actually bigger than we remembered when we looked at it. Thats alot better than it being smaller than we remembered. 

This is the front room. 

The Kitchen. I really like it. Its bigger and more open than our old apartment. We are going to get one more bar stool. (sooner or later) The crappy thing is when we came and looked at the apartment the first time there was a table and 2 or 3 bar stools that were left by the previous tenant; rentmaster asked if we wanted them and we said yeah that would be great! I even asked mentioned that we wanted them left in the apartment several times when I talked to them on the phone throughout the following weeks, and they said yeah no problem! Well, they weren't here when we moved in. Oh well. The stools we got are nicer anyway.

This is the bathroom. You can barely see a door across from the elephant wall hanging in the above picture, there is a stacked washer and dryer in there (YES!) The door to the bathroom is right next to that door but you can't see it in this pics.

Our bedroom is also really big even though we don't have a picture of it. The spare bedroom is small but right now its just full of boxes of camping stuff and things like that. But rest assured if anyone want to come visit you may have noticed our couch is a futon (thanks Chris) and I have no problem clearing out the spare room and throwing down an air mattress!

Big News

Well Lance and I have some big news. We are moving. As most of you know. Due to the economy Lance lost his job a while ago. Since then we have been trying to decide what to do with our lives and we have decided that I should finish school. September first we will be residence of 

Rexberg, Id. After I am done with school, Lance will go to school. Wish us luck!

Big Trip

Last week we went on a trip to Utah. We rode Lance's motorcycle the whole way! It was insane. Absolutely the farthest Lance or I have ever been on a bike. 

We saw a buffalo. (don't worry Katie I saw the original buffalo we saw but didn't have my camera out)

We didn't start taking pictures until we got into Colorado. It was beautiful.

Don't worry that I almost made us wreck off the road to get this picture. I told Lance he needed to get as close to the guard rail as possible so I could get the water in the picture. It was kind of nerve racking.

Call me nerdy but I love seeing the different layers of the rocks and thinking of the millions of years it too for them to form. I kept saying things to Lance like could you imagine what it would have been like to be around when the mountains were formed. I really like geology. 

When we started getting out of Colorado and into Utah we came to a horrible horrible realization. Southern Utah is nothing but a hot hot dry dessert. We were burning up. It was unbelievably hot. We could barley breathe!

This makes me think of the old West.

As we headed north it started to get less desserty and more livable.

My family owns a cabin in Weber Canyon and thats where we were going to be staying while in Utah. I love that cabin. Although we were kinda roughin it. We had to watch our 3D movies on the laptop instead of a plasma TV...

When we first got there my niece and nephew wanted to go down to the water so we took them there. There dad specifically told them not to get wet. When I asked them why they were getting so wet and dirty 7 year old Zoe said, "He never said not to get dirty!" and 4 year old Ike said, "Nobody tell my Dad!" They were so fun. 

There are hammocks right by the cabin, but they were getting kind of old and full of holes. Lance and the kids still liked playing on them, 

Even if they got kind of stuck sometimes.

The kids also had tons of fun on the swings with Lance. 

Lance had fun too! 

Zoe, Madi, and Ike played well together. They are all so cute!

How great to be a kid.

These stairs go down the cliff behind the cabin to the water and are a classic part of the Weber. The are getting kid of old and a little scary but still awesome.

Here is Madi moose being and unicorn moose!

The damn and mean dam builder. The river that goes behind the cabin is SUPER FREEZING COLD but everyone always swims in it anyway. Lance built a really good dam this year and raised the water level above my knees and at least waist deep on the kids. It was fun and FREEZING!

All the sisters were were together on the last night we were there so we had too take a picture. This is how we really are. (meaning Rachel looks like a physco!)

This is the beast picture we got on our camera. There are better pics on my moms camera.

This is in Idaho on our way out of town. I was a little chili.

This is Island Park, ID. Just a pretty view.

By the time we got to Montana it was freezing cold! We had to put on full leathers and face masks. I would have never imagined it would be so cold in August.

We drove through Yellowstone.  

We turned our picture quality down on our camera because we were running out of room so alot of our pics from Yellowstone didn't turn out.

Lance's first glimpse of a geyser.

The bog of eternal stench!

This was Lances favorite part. This lake was HUGE! On our way home we drove through the night. It sucked but was beautiful. 

Basically after this we had to put the camera away because it was too dark to take pictures but let me just tell you what happened. It snowed on us. Thats right snow in August. We were in Wyoming riding our motorcycle through a muddy river bed that was a road under construction. It was the coldest I have ever been. Snow in August. I would have never ever believed it. All together we went 3200 mile, 1200 were in 17 hours on the way home. Let me tell you, 17 hours is a long long long motorcycle ride. It was amazingly fun though. I am sure I will be able to sit again some day.

On Fourth of July weekend, (I know that was a long time ago) Lance and I went to the lake to dive with some friends. Unfortunately and for some reason we didn't really take any pictures at the lake. Our friend did so I will have to get them from him, but on the way home, Lance and I stopped at the USS Batfish. It is a submarine in Oklahoma. How did it get here you ask? Well all the plaques and stuff inside say that it was a "gift" from the United States to the people of Oklahoma. The story that Lance and I had heard through the grapevine was that in the 70's she was decommissioned because she did have nuclear weapons. She was going to be scrapped. Instead of  letting their ship be torn apart the crew commandeered her and brought her up the Navigation Channel where she ran aground at the Port of Muskogee. I think that is when the US decided to 'gift' her to the people of Oklahoma rather than try to pull her all the way back to the gulf just to scrap her out. Anyway its a cool story. I didn't even know there was access to the ocean from Oklahoma. Shows how much I pay attention in school huh. 

I was amazed by the size of everything. I thought everything was going to be small. But this is one of the guns they shot off it.

This is the deck. They are redoing it to make it safer I guess. I never realized that submarines had wooden decks. They were selling 5 inch pieces of the original deck in the gift shop. I thought that would be kind of cool for someone who had served on the Batfish to have.

Every inch of every wall was covered in controls. It was crazy. It would take forever to figure out what everything was for. I am not kidding I mean every inch of every wall. No spare space at all!

You know in all those undersea movies where they are running and jumping through the hatches full speed. That would take some skill. The hatches between rooms were tiny! Like if I put a leg on each side and sat half in one room half in another, my head could touch the top of the hatch.

There were alot of small spaces. There was an open area down the middle or along the side of each room, but there were some places that were really tight fits kind of off the the side. And you know they had to go back into those spots cause remember how I said every inch of every wall had controls. Yep even in the tiny spaces behind huge pieces of equipment there were controls.

Here is the bunk house (room) There were 39 folding beds stacked three high. Lance is on the middle bunk and you can see that if he laid on his side, he was touching the top bunk. Hope your not claustrophobic. Plus, if you think that is tight, you should see the potty and the shower.

Here is the HUGE torpedo! I had no clue that torpedos were that huge! 

I have a picture of me standing beside the Batfish but it was so huge that we had to take three photos and then I photoshopped them together. I look like a little ant in the picture because is it so big. But because of the photoshopping I can't find a format to save it in that it will allow me to post on this blog. I will keep trying though. Anyway, that is the USS Batfish. It was a fun learning expieriance. I kind of want to go back to it with someone that actually knows something about submarines so that they could explain some about each room. It was cool. If you happen to be driving by with some free time. Check is out.

No new posts....

Sorry there have been no new posts. That is because I have had to work the last 4 weeks in a row... it drains my soul out of me. When we first started getting slow at work I thought it sucked but now that I have had to work the last 4 weeks in a row... I feel like my life is over. Pity me.