The Day of Thanks

We spent the Thanksgiving Weekend in a tiny city called La Jara with Aaron's family. All-in-all it was a relaxing break.
I got a kick out of all the small towns we drove through on our way there. This is at a gas station in Gunnison, CO. Yes, that garbage can is wrapped up. :) And yes, there is tinsel on the gas tubes!

This side of the family is quite blessed with boys! They spent time hauling hay and grain,

playing paintball,


and, of course, EATING!


And my goodness, they sure know how to eat!!! Thanksgiving Dinner included a turkey, ham, pork roast, twice-baked potatoes, mashed potatoes, yams, stuffing, homemade cranberry sauce, rolls, shrimp, three different kinds of veggies, two different kinds of fruit salads... and that's all I can remember right now. NO ONE went back for seconds!! Farmers know how to cook! I enjoyed spending time with this side of the fam and getting to know them. Oh and of course we also enjoyed a good win from the Y!

Our trip home started snowy and icy (and gorgeous), but it cleared up very quickly. (This is the top of Chimney Rock near Aaron's hometown--I'm pretty sure I've posted pics of it before. The clouds were doing some pretty awesome stuff!)

We stopped at Wilson's Arch near Monticello and walked up to it to give our legs a rest!


Good times! The holidays are here!!!

A Small Trip

Last weekend we randomly were able to go to Denver to see Aaron's fam!

How it happened: State Cross-Country was supposed to be the week before. Although Aaron had REALLY wanted to go, he had tests the following week, so playing in Denver was definitely not an option! What happened? Denver got like 18" of snow so they pushed it to the next weekend, right after all his tests would be over! What are the odds!!!??

We flew out Friday night and his fam picked us up. The whole thing was a surprise for his little bro who was running in the meet. The meet was Sat morn in a big field. They all ran for 5K. Ryan ended up coming in in the 30's out of over 100 peeps and shaved a minute off of last years time. Not too shabby. I (surprisingly!) didn't take many pics at all.

Here is the beginning of the race. I really liked the bunting (is that what it's called) that lined the path. So festive. :)

And there is Ryan! We were able to find a spot where we could see him like five different times during the race.

Other than that we ate, we chatted, and we played games. It's always great to be with fam and it always goes so quickly.

I do have a small, gross story to share. :) On the flight there, we were on a tiny, tiny plane. We got over the mountains and hit MAJOR turbulence for quite a few minutes. And I got to use a barf bag. :) One thing off my bucket list!

Project #1

I was told by a few people who have graduated from the Accounting Program to expect constant homework once Aaron started school. I chose to believe them and I'm glad I did because it's true! I began making a list of stuff I wanted to do... such as finishing the wedding scrapbook, going through magazines (church-related and not) and keeping the good stuff, sewing, food storage, and cooking. Aaron often sees me in a mess and says, "Oh, you're working on another one of your projects, aren't you?" So now they're called my projects. :)

Here is "Project #1". (I'm fore-seeing a series...)
I have been trying to be all cool and get into food storage and have found these three fabulous websites:
http://funwithfoodstorage.net/
I found this page about building your own rotating can racks (http://foodstoragemadeeasy.net/2009/02/16/build-your-own-can-rotating-rack/) and seriously freaked out. They are so genius and cheap! I used their instructions and sizes for the most part, but did add a little bit of space in case I messed up. My first one was hot-glued and duct-taped but I decided they'd be stronger if I cut slits in the side to slide the cardboard into and then hot-glued them. I made the rest that way and think they'll last longer.

Here is what they looked like before I spray-painted them. (You definitely can leave them un-painted, but mine are out in the open so I felt slightly ghetto.)

And here is the finished product!

Cost? cardboard from dumpster diving :), duct tape, hot glue, a .96 cent can of spray paint, and a bit of time.

I'm totally asking for canned goods for Christmas... I can't wait to have these bad boys filled up! :)

Happy Halloween!

Some friends from the ward, Craig & Jennie (a.k.a. Jennie Craig), invited us over last night for a "pumpkin disemboweling night". :)
Here are the knives:





Obviously there was some anger to get out!
And the bowels. :)

And here are the finished products:

Left is Jennie's, middle is ours (Aaron did the eyes, I did the mouth), and right is Craig's. Obviously Jennie Craig are a bit morbid...
Good times! Thanks so much for the invite!

I hope y'all have a great Halloween!

Cleaning With Becky (a new show!?)

This is totally random, but I taught at a "Relief Society Activity" last night mainly on cleaning with vinegar. I thought I'd share with you in case you are interested!

First off--why clean with vinegar?
1. It's inexpensive. 2. No harsh chemicals or fumes. 3. It's an effective sanitizer.

How to do it?
Get a spray bottle. I fill it about 1/4 full with vinegar and the rest with water, but a lot of websites say to use a 1:1 ratio. It really doesn't matter.... just use the amount relating to how dirty the thing is you are cleaning!
Then you simply spray and wipe clean!

As far as I've found, the only surface that vinegar is harmful to is marble. One site also said to not use full strength on tile grout, but I've never tried. Of course, just like every other substance, test on an inconspicuous area.

In the Kitchen--
Spray on countertops and top of stove and wipe off. It's an effective degreaser.
To deodorize or unclog a drain, put in 1/2 c baking soda, then 1/2 c vinegar and let it sit. (Volcano effect!) Then run water through it.
To clean the microwave, combine 1 c water and 1/2 c vinegar, bring it to a boil in your microwave, and then wipe it clean. Not only will it degrease, but it will get rid of the smell!
You can also clean your oven, fridge, and floors with it. To make a scouring cleanser with 1/4 c baking soda, 1 TBSP dishwashing liquid, and then add vinegar to make it creamyish.

In the Bathroom--
Great glass cleaner.
Spray it in the shower to prevent mildew.
Pour undiluted vinegar in the toilet and scrub with the toilet brush. Let it sit if there are stains; it will get rid of them!

Other Uses--
supposedly kills weeds, keeps ants out of your home, removes stickers, and will help remove armpit stains in the laundry, cleans pots and pans, polish silverware, carpet stain remover (I haven't tried all of these, but they were listed on the websites so do a little research if you're interested).

Besides the first three reasons of why to use vinegar, two others that I think brilliant are that 4. Because it is non-toxic, you can have your kids clean with it and not be nervous about them ingesting it or whatever! And 5. It can be your 'food storage' for cleaning... buy a big bottle of vinegar and big bag of soda and you're set for months of cleaning!

The two best websites I've found for hundreds of ideas are www.vinegartips.com and www.armhammer.com.

The only con I've found is the smell. I thought I would hate it, but it seriously disappears and just smells clean very quickly. A friend who didn't like the smell said she would cut a lemon or orange in half and rub it over the top of her countertop after cleaning to have that smell instead.

So that was my little spiel on vinegar. I was introduced to it earlier this year by my friend Stephanie Hansen and I've really found that I love it. I have not yet made it the only product I use, but from everything I've read, it sounds like it can be! Other than the vinegar I shared a couple other random things.

My "Golden Rules of Cleaning"--
1. DON'T HATE IT! You need to do it for the rest of your life so why not enjoy it!? Enjoy the time to think and do a mindless activity! Enjoy seeing what you've accomplished.
2. Spend about five minutes every day tidying. It is amazing how if you do this, that you only have to do a quick, deep clean every other week.
3. Keep cleaners handy and organized. Keep a spray bottle of the vinegar under your kitchen and bathroom sink so you can just pull it out and quickly spray and wipe.
4. After finishing the dishes, quickly spray the vinegar mixture around the sink, faucet, and counter and wipe it up... it's amazing how clean it stays.
5. Clean from top to bottom. Dry to wet.
6. Make your bed daily! It's amazing the difference it can make in the feel of the room and in your attitude!
7. Get yourself in the habit of putting dishes directly in the dishwasher instead of the sink first. If you don't have a dishwasher, simply rinse them as you put them in the sink. Then you pretty much never have to scrub!
8. Dust weekly with a microfiber cloth. You will never have dust buildup and it goes so quick every time!

And a list of how to make your home look spiffy in a jiffy! (ex. when someone tells you they're coming in 15 min!)
1. A quick vacuum
2. Clean your chrome. Take a rag and spray and shine the faucets... they look fabulous!
3. Organize your clutter. If you've got junk on your counter, straighten it. Or grab a laundry basket and grab all the things that you don't want seen, throw them in it and hide it somewhere they won't see it and put it away later. If you have kids, people expect to see toys on the floor, but if you have a bucket specifically for toys, you can scoop some of them into it.
4. Spray something fresh, open the windows, or light a candle.
5. Check the trash to make sure you don't have a huge pile or a stinky pile.
6. Quickly clean the bathroom, just in case!

And last, some "Green Tips"--
-Instead of using paper towels, use thin rags like this to clean up.
Some people use their dish rags, but I think my dishrags are cute and don't want nasty spaghetti stains on them! I don't care about these ones though and you just throw them in the wash and they work fabulously!
-I never fill up my garbage can before it starts to stink... and I hate tossing the big bags when it's not 143% full! Whenever I forget my 'green bags' at the store, I take home the plastic ones and use one of them a day... I put my chicken strofoam, food remnants, etc in it and then toss it daily. Also, when you've got an empty cereal box, fill it with the junk instead of the bag. (I don't have the ability to recycle.)
-Last, if you've got a baby, make your own baby wipes!
Take a roll of paper towels (the nicer brand) and cut it in half with a knife or whatever. Find a container that will hold the half in it and place it inside. Combine 2 to 2 1/2 cups water, 1 TBSP baby oil, and 1 tsp baby soap and mix them. Then pour it over the paper towels and down the middle. Wait about 5 minutes and pull up on the cardboard in the center and the paper towels will come out of the middle following!

I wouldn't say I'm a clean connoisseur or anything; it's more that I'm OCD. :) I really loving having things fresh and clean and feel so much better about myself when they are.

60 years!

My grandparents celebrated their 60th Wedding Anniversary!

(Getting them to smile was obviously not the easiest thing.) :)
They have three children, sixteen grandchildren, and currently twelve great-grandchildren.
We had a nice dinner with them to celebrate. I love them and the hilarious memories I have with them.
We even pulled out my grandma's wedding dress and my sister and I tried it on. Way cool. :)

I'm so glad that my grandparents have been part of my life for so many years. I hope we make it 60 years!!

Experiment

I have always had a liking for Science Fair Projects... except when I had to do them myself because then I could never come up with anything to do! Ha!

Remember that table quilt I made back Easter time?
Well as we've spilled on it occasionally I've spot cleaned it and some of the red squares have bled onto the white. I was way sad. (Yes I did wash the fabrics before I made it.) Well fall is now here and it is time to put it away. But it definitely needed to be washed for real before going into storage. I was so, so sad at the thought of my hard work being ruined and turning all pink so I thought I'd look online for ideas. I found websites that said that salt would seal the colors, that vinegar would seal the colors, and that neither of those would seal the colors...

So I set out for my Science Fair Project! I got out four bowls, cut up some of the scraps from that quilt, especially the ones that were bleeding, and set up the test!

First Bowl: Cold Water and Salt
Second Bowl: Cold Water and Vinegar
Third Bowl: Cold Water
Fourth Bowl: Warm Water

Within minutes the warm water was turning red, then a few minutes after the cold water. The vinegar and salt stayed clear. A couple hours later the vinegar had started to turn red but the salt was still clear. So I washed my quilt with salt water and detergent and dried it immediately and it worked. Phew!!

After a whole day, these were my final results:

Salt still clear. Vinegar the most red!?!

Waters both a little red.

I was grateful I was able to find a solution (the internet is amazing in that way!) and I thought that maybe some of you craft-doers might find it helpful. The other thing I found while searching that I thought was helpful is to throw a piece of a cut-up white t-shirt into the washing machine with your fabric when you are pre-washing it to make sure that there is still not dye in it... sometimes it can take multiple times to get the dye out (and sometimes it may never all come out!)

Home Improvement

I used to love that show back in the day!

Anyway, we've had a couple exciting improvements at our little abode that have made me pretty giddy!

1. Thonet Bentwood Rocker.

I found this beauty at a garage sale for $10 a couple months back and couldn't resist. The only problem with it is that it creaked with every rock. After about an hour of adjusting screws, it doesn't creak anymore! I was stoked! I still find myself going over to sit in it every day just to check and make sure I am not imagining that it doesn't creak. :)

2. Wall Hooks

Our apartment has no closets, no shelves, no storage whatsoever. We've dealt with it well enough but when we were up in Logan I saw some some hooks on a wall and I was inspired. It's kinda lame always having jackets draped all over stuff, so I found these little hooks and installed them just inside our doorway. I love them!

3. Armoire
Like I said, we have no storage. Therefore, this is what my 'craft spot' looked like.

And then a previous roomie announced she was moving and selling some of her furniture. I jumped at the offer and was able to get an armoire at a ridiculously good price. It did require a bit of fixing but I was so up for that!

And here is the craft area now! Oh so clean and friendly. Love it!

Small things like this make me pretty excited. It's so fun to have small things that make such a huge improvement!

Our State Fair is a Great State Fair!

First off, thank you all so much for your comments on our anniversary... they seriously mean the world to me. I love friends.

So I went to the State Fair on the opening night! It was $2 which was affordable. :) I wouldn't have gone except that my sister invited me to go because she had entered a couple things!! So first things first! Her entries!

She made this dress for Halloween! And it won 2nd place!!!

And just because I'm obsessed with it because it's amazing, here are a couple other pictures.

Seriously look at the detail... gorgeous! Amazing!

And the other one is the musical quilt all folded up here. We were a bit sad to see that it wasn't displayed very nicely at all. :( First off, it was upside down!! Second, the quilting pattern she did (treble cleffs, half notes, musical notes, etc) is what really set it apart... and you couldn't even tell! Anyway, great job to her; I think it's awesome she made them. And even awesomer she entered. And even awesomest she won for her dress!

And now other random stuff in case you care. :) I really enjoyed the "Home Arts" tent because of all the ideas I could get! Here are a few pics of things I was quite impressed by.
How cute is this Halloween quilt!? The legs dangle off the quilt. Way cute.

This is an incredible sampler!

And this is just insane. Can you imagine CROSS-STITCHING this? There are only like three colors there!!!

I just thought this was adorable. I love the border. So unique.

Out of the Home Arts. And into the Square Dancing! I took this pic because of the girl in the SpongeBob dress! Ha!

And onto the animals! I look lame in the picture because every time I'd smile, the sheep would move its head and I thought it was going to bite me. :) They're pretty big but they didn't bite.

HUGE cows. Massive udders.

This goat cracked me up. He was checking how things looked from a rung higher. :)

This is the hairiest bunny I've ever seen! (Not quite Truffle, Aliese!)

And onto the floral part. So pretty!

I loved these "Bells of Ireland". I'm all sorts of tender when it comes to things being named like that for some reason.

HUGE zinnia? (Perhaps Mandy can verify?)

Freaking adorable house. If you look close, there is a playground, all sorts of chairs and other stuff. Talent!

And just for randomness... Mona Goat?

It was fun to go with my sister and I think I'd be a fan of going on another $2 day. :)

First Anniversary!

It was exciting to celebrate our First Anniversary! Time has FLOWN!

I asked Aaron over a month ago to plan something because I knew he'd get caught up in school! He kept it completely secret from everyone and definitely surprised me.

We started in the afternoon (after homework was done!) and he took me to the Nauvoo Cafe in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building. It's totally one of my faves and it was fun to look at all the pictures of Nauvoo there. Plus that, it's delish.

And then we took off driving. When we got past Ogden he asked if I knew where we were going and I said Logan. I was right!
We got there and went to the temple and were able to do sealings. TOTALLY awesome and special.

And then we checked into an adorable Bed and Breakfast he'd booked. It's a 110 year old home.

And then food! The guy who owns the B&B suggested Firehouse and oh man it was so good!! I requested that we get take-out so we could sit on the porch of the B&B and just soak in the evening. It was marvelous.

We had ice cream that night (we pretty much never splurge, so it was so fun to do it so many times in one day!) and then watched our wedding video and mushy stuff like that. Ha.
This is the room. I just loved how homey it was... so not hotel-ish.

Sunday morning we got up and they fed us our breakfast. It was apple pancakes with bacon and fruit... it was delicious! Then Aaron told me that we weren't going to church until three so we had all morning to just hang out. We went over to the dam and watched the ducks and geese. There were like four fathers and sons in over the hour that we were there and we just loved watching them and laffing with them and watching their faces. The geese are HUGE (like six times the size of the ducks!) and they were sure greedy! It was fun to watch all the ducks leave when the bread was gone and then the second someone new threw a piece in, TONS came over immediately!


I kept asking why we couldn't go to church earlier and finally he told me that we were going to a Nursing Home. WHAT!? I kept thinking and thinking about it and about 1:00 I figured it out... our teachers and dear friends who we met in Nauvoo, the Huffs, must be involved with that. I had really wanted to see them from the second I figured out we were going to Logan but hadn't mentioned it not wanting to take away from Aaron's plans. He had called them a month ago and set things up with them! Brother Huff is the Branch President at a Nursing Home so we went there with them (and had some good laffs at the random outbursts of the old people! "Wow, that guy is huge!" and in the middle of a story, "OH WELL.") and then had dinner with them afterwards. We chatted for hours and it was SO wonderful to see them.

It was such a great anniversary. It was wonderful to spend hours together without homework or stress. Aaron planned a perfect trip for us and it made me so happy. Hopefully we'll share many, many more!

Antelope Island

We wanted to take the best advantage we could of the last Summer Saturday because we understand that with the starting of school, we may not see each other anymore! We decided to check out Antelope Island. We started off the trip with a ginormous Monster Energy Drink! (We found it on the ground... I hope Aaron doesn't quit entertaining me by doing whatever pose I tell him!)

We decided the path we wanted to take and headed out. It was a 15 mile loop. So off we went. It was okay for a bit, but the trail turned to sand every few hundred feet and it was so hard to get through.

It was insane the amounts of lizards there were. There were 100's running along with our bike tires. It kinda freaked me out!

We finally saw a TREE!! I seriously think this tree deserves an award for being such a great tree and one of the only ones on the island!

We almost got to the tree... and Aaron got a flat. :(

But it was okay because I didn't really consider what we were doing a biking trail anyway! I was hiking 1/3 of the time anyway! So it was a welcome break. We were about 5 miles in at this point. We wanted to keep going so we hiked for a bit. It was wonderful and overcast and we were enjoying ourselves greatly. We came to this horse corral. According to the sign (seriously the only one on the island) it is unknown who built it and how long ago, etc. Cool.

And here we are with the Elephant Head!

Another pic of the Elephant Head. The cute little elephant wants to get some water!

We rounded the mid-point and came to the Split Rock which the trail is named after.

And then the sun came out. 93 and hot. And we began to run out of water. And absolutely no shade. We walked/dragged ourselves that whole thing.

We finally made it back to that tree and I rested hoping to not die of heat exhaustion. My face was bright red; you can kind of see it in the pic.

And then we had the five miles to go back to the car to our other water supply. (FYI, we're not complete idiots-- we had TONS more than needed for the bike ride... and things were fine until the sun came out and we climbed uphill for couple miles.) We were out of water by that time so I sent Aaron back on my bike to get the water and I walked his. The path is kinda pleasant with the sunflowers, but that sand is NOT your friend!)

Anyway, we survived to tell the tale but we were hot and headacheish and thirsty! All's well that end's well!
We went back to the Visitor's Center to wash off and cool off and found this adorable little keepsake. I've ALWAYS wanted to keep a buffalo in my purse! Who wouldn't?! Didn't purchase, unfortunately.

We went down to the south end of the island where the Garr Ranch is. Mr. Garr was sent there by Brigham Young. His ranch was AWESOME. The family has kept it up really well and it was fun to go around and see all the stuff. And Aaron got to lasso some cattle. :)

Cool silo.

Then we headed back to watch the sunset. We got to see some fabulous wildlife on the way.

We came to a herd of 80ish buffalo crossing the road! They were SO fun to watch. Buffalo are quite possibly my current favorite animal. We're considering making a section of our budget for me to purchase a buffalo as a pet. :) Anyway, I was so excited to see so many buffalo!

This big guy had quite the itch... and just couldn't quite get it! They're such HUGE animals!!

This one is totally a fave.

And the sun began to set. Yay!


We decided to run down to the water's edge and play a bit. Yes, it stunk quite a bit, but it was fun. :) When we took of our shoes we realized how DIRTY we were!



These shots were so fun and cool!



We were proud of ourselves for completely wearing out our legs and were glad to have spent the day together. All-in-all, I think Antelope Island has my approval. The first half of the day I was kinda lamed-out, but it got better. :) I am really unimpressed by the lack of signs on the island and trails and how incorrect the maps were... we ended up in the wrong place way too many times, but the variety of stuff was fun.

Yellowstone Trip

We got news of a "Free Day" at Yellowstone and couldn't turn it down!

We drove up on Friday and stopped in Idaho Falls and did a session in the temple. Beautiful. We also stopped and saw an old Nauvoo friend, Randy, and his fam.


Then we drove up to St. Anthony where we met up with our friends Wes and Mandy. We had dinner, went on a walk, and played 'Ticket to Ride' (definitely a current obsession!) before hitting the sack so that we could be in the park bright and early.
We went into the park on Saturday morning and drove through a lot of this. It is so beautiful in its own way. It's very cool to see the re-growth since the fires. The little trees are so bright green and look like grass and are so thick. It will be awesome to watch the park change over the years.

I wonder what happened to this tree... so cool.

We came to our first stop... and started breaking the rules immediately...

This is Mammoth Hot Springs... I'd love to see it all wet.

And elk!!

We drove to our next spot from there and came to this HUGE traffic jam.

We jumped out assuming that it had to be a grizzly bear to create such a stir... and there was!! He was pretty small and pretty far away as you can see by the picture... but he was still a grizzly bear and they are rare!

We got quite a laff about all the people... some people had camera's that were over two feet long!

And here are the (idiot) dare-devils who needed to have a better picture. :)

Kept on driving and enjoyed more burnage and growage. I really think it is incredible and beautiful.


Next stop: Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone! It's INCREDIBLE!!!


From our view, we could see all these stairs on the other side of the cliff. We made those our goal!

The hike to Uncle Tom's Stairs started with a view of Upper Falls.

And after climbing down the stairs,

we were able to see the gorgeous Lower Falls. SO PRETTY!

And pretty fab rainbow reflection at the bottom.

Here's all of us. Wes and Mandy were fabulous hosts. You can see our hoodies... it was COLD up there that weekend! At night it got down to 32! Brr! I'm sure people were laffing at me for wearing a coat (not in this picture), but when you leave 100 degree weather and go to 50 degrees... that's quite a change!!

And then began the trek UP the 350ish stairs! Here is Aaron pretending to pant... yes we were making fun of the tourists who we thought were going to kill themselves. :) Yes, we're mean. :)

A cool view of the canyon from the stairs.

We started on again and finally saw bison/buffalo!!! I thought this was going to be the closest we would get...

until we came to a lone one right on the side of the road! We came up to it going verrrrrrrry slowly and I put my camera out and...

all the sudden he looked at me and started walking into the car! The picture is fuzzy because I screamed and was pulling my arms back in! It was SO awesome! He was seriously like a foot away from me. And now I'm obsessed with buffalo. In fact, I made us buy a buffalo Christmas ornament in this fuzzy guy's honor. :) He crossed the road right after our car.

We drove past Lake Yellowstone

to go see Old Faithful. Here are the crowds of people waiting.

That little smoke puff is where it comes out of. Pretty incredible.

Old Faithful was about 10 minutes late and we were laffing our heads off at the comments people around us were making. "You'd think they could set it off on time." "Yeah and why don't they announce it?" "Seriously, they should put music to it or have music going off like the Bellagio Fountains." We were trying so hard not to laff... they totally thought this was man-made!! We were afraid it would scare the heck out of them to hear that the earth naturally made this geyser explode. :) And there she blows!!

And we pretty much own this place so we had to get our pic with it.

We continued on. We stopped at a few geyser basins and emerald pools.

That's boiling water... that's insane!!

Gorgeous!

Boiling MUD!

This bad boy was created in recent years after an earthquake! In the Spring it gushes water but in the Fall it's all dry and MOANS REALLY LOUD! It was kinda freaky! (Maybe we should have double-checked it wasn't a person who had fallen in...)


I was pretty intrigued by this death and carnage.



And that was our day at Yellowstone! We went around the entire park in one day! We can't believe how much we saw and are sure there is tons more to see. We'll have to go back. I love to see how unique nature is and to learn how they different areas were created. (For example, all of Yellowstone is on top of a Super Volcano!) National Parks are the bomb. Especially when they're free. :)

That night we went to the infamous Big Jud's. To have your picture taken and be on the Big Jud's wall, you have to eat this hamburger (hand is showing the size), a full order of fries, a drink, and a huge waffle cone!!


Aaron and Wes split it and did finish it all off. (No picture on the wall though, because you have to do it singlely.) I was impressed though... that's A LOT of food!

That evening we watched a movie and the next morning we went to church with them which included many experiences that had us laffing for hours. We had SUCH a great time up there. A huge thank you to them!

Simple Minds; Simple Pleasures

I have a simple mind, but things like this make me smile.

What a ridiculous car to jack up and put rims on!!!


What a sweet teenager... dressing up her little lion backpack... and protecting it from SARS or Swine Flu.


Good times. I wish I could be so cool.

Qquirrh Mountain Temple (and a visit)

I feel like I can say that I really know this temple! I have now watched the video and been on the the tour three times! It really is a beautiful temple .

The first time I was on a "special guest tour" since my work sells some of the fabric they chose.
The second time was with my fam.

And the third time was with his fam.

Which obviously means we had a visit from Colorado!
Aaron's fam came up last weekend. We had them over in our ghetto fabulous apartment for dinner on Thursday night and then met them for the Temple Open House Friday night and went to dinner after.
Saturday morn we had them over for breakfast. And then our day of shopping insanity began! I have been telling them they need to go to IKEA for over a year... and finally got them to go! I think they were a bit 'skeptical' wondering why I would take them to a furniture store! I was thrilled when within the first minute they were already amazed. :) And that we ended up being there for about four hours. :)
They, too, fell in love with the Poang chair and ended up getting one! Ronski and I hope to have these someday when we're rich and famous. :)

Our big purchase was a clothes drying rack. It saves us a $1 a load for us to air dry our clothes so I'm a fan... though our wooden rack isn't the greatest... in fact, we're on our second one because the other one broke... So when I saw this one I almost melted. Aaron immediately said we needed it and it was sold. I tried it out yesterday and it's pretty fab. :)

After IKEA we went to the movie UP! We all really liked it.
And then more shopping. Lowe's, Bed, Bath, and Beyond, and multiple clothing stores! (Pagosa offers none of this type of stuff.)
After shopping, we had dinner at the Pi Pizzeria and then went and climbed Ensign Peak. It was relaxing and enjoyable to watch the city.

I love, love, love summer nights... I don't want them to end! It was good to have his fam here and we all had a good time.

Bear Lake

Last weekend we had The First Official Janssen Family Reunion. Okay so really it wasn't really official but we'll pretend. :) My fam all met up at Bear Lake for a few days of camping and good times.

We got up there Thursday night and were excited to see the beautiful lake. Aaron has never seen it before so it was fun to show him around.

All good camping trips involve cooking. Here is my dad expertly cooking Roosti. (Secret family recipe so don't even think of asking...)

It was delish. I'm holding a picture of Flat Brad so we could feel of his presence while he's on his mission.

Friday brought a variety of activities. Wadds spent some time enjoying "Anne" books,

all of us went on a bike ride and Dan chose to indulge in awkward spandex moments,

and we all went hiking to the Limber Pine later that afternoon. My family tries our hardest to get awkward pictures and I think we do quite well. Here's Sheshe and Jen,

all us girls (some riding a random tree),

and my peeps standing on a "tree hotel" representing SelectHealth quite well. (Some of my family did a ride for diabeties last year and were given a plethora of riding attire.)

There was pretty stuff along the trail like SEGO LILIES!!! (I only think I've seen one other in my life!)

and quite a few beautiful butterflies. (The only way I got a picture of this one is because it was dead...)

The trail ends at the largest limber pine... five trees that grew together! One sign said it was 2000 years old and one said 250 so I won't say how old it is. I do know that it's big though!

And of course awkward fake engagement pics were a must...

Saturday we went to a place called Tony's Grove. We had read that the wildflowers there are incredible... and they sure were!


We went on a bike ride around the lake and got about halfway and found out that it really wasn't a bike trail... there were lots of rocks and we ended up walking our bikes probably a fourth of the way. It was fine though... it was so beautiful! These pictures don't even do the flowers justice!










That afternoon Aaron and I went on our own bike ride that we'd heard about. It's called Round Valley and is supposedly where some of the earliest settlers of Bear Lake lived. We were told there was a ghost town schoolhouse, mansion, and a cemetary that we would see. We must be blind because we're pretty sure we missed them!
This is a view of the valley. The road was pretty much right up against all the mountains on each side. It was really fun and really beautiful. And really windy. :)

This was the only thing I saw that I thought could maybe be one of the old remnants...

This garage cracked me up. I love the fake brick siding in desperate need of repair... and the ESCALADE inside it. :)

Oh, this was in someone's backyard and it looked old, but I don't know if it was one of the originals? But it still looked cool. I have a place in my heart for old things for some reason.





And you can sure bet we didn't park here. !!???!!

We finished the ride and went down to the lake to play for a bit.


I was really obsessed with how pretty the shells and colors looked together. Good ol' Mother Nature is pretty fab with interior design.

We met up with my fam at the beach and of course had to go get a raspberry shake. Yum yum yum!
Sunday we went to church down in Garden City. It could be compared to insanity. There were hundreds of people there and it took over 20 people to pass the sacrament! We spent the afternoon eating and playing games and then some of us had to head back to reality.

It was such a blast. We laffed so hard and had such a good time.