Lindsay's Adventures!

2012-01-29T22:11:00.003Z

You can't tell yet...

But there is a baby in there!!!

This is my pic from 13 weeks, I am now closer to 15 weeks, and maybe showing a tiny bit more. Hopefully I will post more pics soon. Carson and I were so happy when we found out just a week before Thanksgiving that we are going to have a baby. We decided to keep it a secret until Christmas and then we would tell both our families. Boy was it hard to not say anything when we saw everyone for Thanksgiving, but we managed. Then for Christmas we wrapped up our ultrasound picture, a cute little Christmas outfit (that will hopefully fit our little one by the time Christmas rolls around again), and some diapers. At the Dalton's we let Morgan open the present because she told us that all she wanted for Christmas was to be an aunt. She screamed she was so excited, as was everyone else. We let my Mom open the gift at the Holyoak's, and I am not really sure what everyone's initial reaction was because I was sitting next to Stacy who was yelling at Jeremy that he was missing everything. I did hear my Mom exclaim, "there is only one," when she saw the ultrasound picture. I guess one set of twin grandkids is not enough for her. The baby is due on July 24th, which seems really far away to me. I have been feeling pretty good so far, just a couple headaches, and only one or two trips to the bathroom to toss my breakfast (always at work because it is much more embarrassing there).

Besides sharing our exciting news, we also had a really fun Christmas. We managed to both get a few days off so we could have a little longer vacation. We played games, ate great food, and got to spend lots of time with family. We also got family pictures taken on my side, something that has not happened in a long time since it is so hard to get all of us together. Our pictures won't lack character though because there was lots of crying and unhappiness from some of the younger ones, and of course since I have the brothers that I have, there were many snowballs thrown directly at the head. It was not uncommon to be standing there patiently waiting to get your picture taken, and then all the sudden you would get hit in the back of the head. I'm sure there is snow, and more than one messed up hairdo caught on camera.

Now one more amusing story for the end of my post. The other day I was at work and this little 4 year old girl kept climbing and jumping on me. I finally told her that she couldn't jump on my belly because there was a baby in there. She immediately says, "Are you fat?" and starts trying to lift up my shirt. It was way funny, and then she would ask me if my baby was crying? Kids say the funniest things.

Decorating!!

2011-11-29T20:19:00.003Z

Oops I didn't really mean to go a month without posting, but since Carson and I seem to be forgetting our camera everywhere we go, there were no pictures, or worthy stories to post about.

We did have an awesome Thanksgiving (even though there are no pictures). We got to go to Moab for a quick trip, and even though we would have liked to have gotten to stay longer, we also like being employed. Anyway we had Thanksgiving at 1:00 with the Daltons, and then at 2:00 with the Holyoaks, so we were very stuffed by the end of the day. It is so fun to see family, and we played many games, and ate lots of yummy food. It was awesome. The day after Thanksgiving we had to head back home so Carson could go to work that night, but that just gave us a head start in getting our Christmas tree and decorations up.

We headed out one morning in search of a suitable tree, but oddly enough even though we drove around for hours all we could find were cedar trees, or very large pines. We had gone out past Carson's work because he said he saw a guy driving back from there with 3 trees in the back of his truck. Well we have no idea where he got his trees, because we couldn't find anything that we would even consider cutting down (and believe me were were not being picky at that point). So the next day we headed out again to a different spot, and we found our perfect tree surprisingly fast.

Our tree in its former home!

Superman after cutting it down

Carson begged me to let us get a yum yum tree this year, and then he even let me cut it down, a duty I took very seriously

Our stockings (can you guess which one is Carson's)

And our tree all decorated in its new home! I love our Christmas tree because we collect ornaments whenever we go someplace new, it is a tradition I started when I was off traveling the world. It makes me happy to see the ornaments now and think "that came all the way from China, or Ireland, or Switzerland..." Our newest ornament this year came from Yellowstone.

Pumpkins and other stuff...

2011-10-29T17:42:00.008+01:00

Carson and I headed over to Megan and Andrew's to carve pumpkins the other day. We had to distract Alex a bit, but we had so much fun. I really like carving pumpkins, too bad you have to do the messy cleaning them out part first.

My witch and Carson's spooky tree

Our birthday party!! Carson and Andrew planned this little get together all on their own, and Andrew made us a sweet brownie cake.

Happy Birthday to us!!!

And the rest of the pics are of my Halloween village. I started collecting last year with a large total of 1 house. This year Megan got me another, so I decided that I would try to get a whole village, unfortunately some of the houses and buildings, and even the accessories are very expensive. So I decided I would try to make my own accessories, and even though they don't look as good at the ones at the store, I think it is way cool. I couldn't get a very good picture of it all lit up, but it looks pretty spooky and realistic in the dark.

We even made little hay bales :-)

Birthday Fun!!

2011-10-26T22:32:00.009+01:00

Last week Carson and I headed up North for my friend Chelsey's wedding. The day started off rocky when things started going wrong for me at work, resulting in me getting off later than I was planning. Then I get home thinking Carson would be packed and ready to go, but instead he calls me to tell me he is stranded about 20 miles out of town. Seriously!!! He had gone out with his construction class, but hours later everyone was still working and he couldn't get a ride back. So I hurry and unload all my heavy work stuff out of my car and up the flight of stairs into our apt (it was about 4-5 trips), then pack some clothes for the weekend as fast as I can to so I can go pick up my stranded husband from the freeway exit. We were finally on our way, and estimated to arrive before the line at the reception was scheduled to end, but of course we got a little lost on our way to the place, and we barely missed them cutting the cake. We were there for the awesome dance solo that the bride and groom performed. Chelsey was such a beautiful bride, and it was so cool to get to attend the sealing the next day in the Draper Temple

Since our trip was close to my birthday, we decided to splurge and go to a haunted forest on our way home. It was way cool, longer than we expected, and with some new things that I had never seen before like this creepy clown that chased us around with a lawn mower. The scariest part was at the end when you have to get on this slide and go down, it was dark so the slide didn't look very long, but it turned out to be much longer than it looked, and then out of no where sparks start flying at you, and yeah I will admit I screamed.

We also made a trip to Gardner Village to see the witches!!! Carson is such a good sport to go with me even though it was pretty crowded. We had such a fun trip, now some other friends need to get married (Keara... Becca...) so we can do it again real soon.

Cookies!!!

2011-10-16T20:48:00.003+01:00

These 2 sure are cute together!!!

The other night Carson and I got together with Megan and Andrew and our friends Courtney and Zach to make Halloween cookies. We had lots of fun, and there was lots of creativity going. Andrew even sang us a little song about one of his cookies.

These are the 2 cookies that Carson decorated (halfway through decorating the bottom one I asked him what it was, he didn't really appreciate that).

2011-10-15T17:41:00.002+01:00

You see this little guy...

He came over to play with me the other day.

And even though I spent the next day...

sweeping and mopping crackers off the floor,

putting all the books back in the bookcase,

putting the cans back in the cupboard,

vacuuming up the spilled crumbs from the entire pan of peanut butter fingers that ended up on the floor (although let's be honest that was really more his mom's fault),

and putting all my Halloween decorations back up...

I just want to say one thing...

ALEX come back and play anytime!!!!

Fall Fun!!

2011-10-13T21:05:00.003+01:00

I LOVE fall!!! It is my favorite time of year, I love the colors, the weather, the leaves.. everything. Plus my birthday is in the fall, as well as the start-up to the best holidays of the year. I have been a little slow getting my Halloween decorations up this year though, because even though our lives sound really boring when I try to write about them in a blog, or a letter to Dallen, we are really actually very busy. But Carson and I did find time to go to Yankee Meadows the other day for a hot dog roast, and to see all the fall leaves. We also got to have our first snowball fight of the year. It is hard to say who won though, because while I hit Carson with more snowballs than he hit me with, he takes the award for the best hit with a well placed snowball right to my chest that knocked the wind out of me. He takes his snowball fighting very seriously.

Anyway here is a picture of the beautiful lake. The picture below is Nathan's refrigerator art from our family reunion. Crystal was riding home from church with my parents, and this message is for them. Even though the flash make the 2 hard to see, I think it is really funny.

Isn't he creative!!! I wonder how long it took him to make???

I love Carson!!!

2011-09-13T20:00:00.000+01:00

If you don't want to read a mushy tribute to my husband, than this post is not for you, because that is exactly what this is (except with a bit of a twist since I am going to reveal all of Carson's little quirks).

Carson makes me laugh everyday with the funny little quirks he has. For example the biggest one that comes to mind right now (that is actually kinda starting to bug me) is that Carson loves to wake me up when I am sleeping, seriously it is like he is five years old. I have to get up really early for work, at least I consider five or any time before that rather early, so when I get home from work I like to take a little nap. But it never fails that as soon as I fall asleep Carson wakes me up for some reason or another. He won't admit that he likes to do it, he even denies it in fact, but I am convinced he must like to do it, because every single day without fail he does it again.

Carson also enjoys to quiz me on the hymns at church, so he won't let me see the book when we are singing. He does praise me after though, because more often than not I surprisingly know all the words to the songs.

Carson does not like to do the dishes, so if there is half a sink of dishes, he does them, and is so proud of himself that he is sure to mention to me that he did the dishes. (He is no where to be found when there are large stacks of dishes in and around the sink)

He takes his hunting very seriously. When he was on his mission he sent me his journals, and I thought it was so funny because he wrote pages and pages on the day that he killed his first deer with his bow, any other event is lucky to get 1 line of text. He will tell you every detail of the day if you ask him about his hunting trips too.

Neither of us really love to shop, but if there is something I need and and he ends up going to a store with me he tries to be really helpful by... disappearing. Seriously within seconds I cannot find him anywhere. He thinks that he is not pressuring me to hurry or something, but if I just need to go in and look at something really quick I end up spending way more time looking for him than I did looking at any merchandise. He's so thoughtful though.

Carson gets really into books on CD when we drive places. So then when we get home he will come inside and within minutes he is asking if we can just sit and finish listening to the book.

He talks in his sleep. The topics can get very interesting based on whatever is going on in life at the time.

He thinks that Diapers are easier to put on backward rather than forward.

He puts BBQ sauce on his salads.

He doesn't like to get sprayed with water, so even when he showers, he stays out of the water as much as possible. (He likes baths though which I think is funny)

His all time favorite cereal is... Bran Flakes. Seriously of all the delicious cereal choices there are he picks Bran Flakes as his top choice.

He has trouble staying awake at church, and has even been known to fall asleep during the rest hymn. We pack snacks in our bags like we have little kids to keep Carson awake.

He will wear his socks until they completely fall apart. He thinks it is a waste to buy a new pack before the other ones are all worn thru.

Even if he wakes me up, wears holey socks, eats nasty cereal, and sleeps thru church, I still love him more than anything. He makes me laugh every day, is the perfect guy for me, and the best husband I could ask for.

Love you babe!!

2011-08-01T16:37:00.002+01:00

Carson and I got to hike Kanarraville Falls the other day with Megan and Andrew. The hike was so pretty, and we had a really good time. Unfortunately the water was so cold, and you had to walk in it for long stretches sometimes, by the time we were thru some of the little slot canyons my feet were numb and aching.

A few days after we did the hike, someone mentioned to us that they had seen a 4 foot rattlesnake on that hike the weekend before, I am so glad I did not know this before we went because I would have been totally freaked the whole time.

Isn't Family Fun???

2011-07-20T23:29:00.003+01:00

Carson and I are so lucky that we get to go visit family so often. We headed down to Moab last weekend to go to another reunion but of course we planned a little time to play first. When we got to town we stopped to see Carson's family and by the time we were heading out to my parents house I had 2 messages on my phone from my sister begging Carson and I to take my nephew to Harry Potter at midnight (like she really had to pull my arm to get me to go, and to go for free at that) Anyway apparently her orthodontist rented out the whole theater and let his patients go for free. With an opportunity to not go Stacy claimed said was old and could not do a midnight movie, so she gave Carson her spot, then we just had to talk Payton into giving me hers, she was easily persuaded with the promise of a princess movie for her, and good thing too because I don't think she would have liked the movie. In fact she might have been worse than Parker who asked me questions throughout the whole movie (on our way there I learned that he had not seen part one). Well I didn't mind him asking me questions, but he doesn't really whisper when he asks them so every once in a while we would get looks from the people around us. It was fun to get to take him though, and I loved the movie, Carson has seen all the movies, but he still tends to get a little lost, so he might not have loved it as much as me.

Then next morning we got to go meet brand new Cheznie Mae, number 7 on my "Proud Aunt List." Tori is doing great, motherhood fits her well, like we always knew it would.

After that we got to head to the cabin where I killed everyone in squeek twice!!!

Nathan cooking breakfast!!! Can you believe it? It was actually really good!!

The new skylight in the cabin. The boys spent the morning fixing the stovepipe. Us girls tried to avoid helping. Stacy assured me she gets to be the favorite because she helped the most, well that is fine by me (although I am pretty sure I climbed the ladder more times than her). Not that we don't want to help, it's just that the boys tend to bark commands at us as they run by and they expect us to be able to find whatever strange named items they list. Then they act like we are dumb when it takes a few tries to get the right supplies.

These 2 spent lots of time breaking in Parker's new bow.

I don't know how I managed this. You see I made friends with Kendra early on, but Kayla doesn't really want anything to do with me. Nathan managed to slip her on my lap once though without her really noticing who was holding her (or maybe she had just given up resisting at that point, she does look a little tired in the picture)

Crystal showing off her and Payton's moth collection. There were so many moths, even after my parents spent the weekend before battling them.

After one night at the cabin it was time to go to the reunion, we finally made it there only about 2 more hours of stovepipe repairs than we had anticipated. We forgot to bust out the camera the first day, so we don't have very many pictures, but we had a good time.

We were given a bag of supplies and told to make a tractor with them. This is our bulldozer. We won most realistic (which means the other ones must have been really odd looking)

I have never really played horse shoes much, except last year at the reunion, and this year at the reunion, so I am not very good. I did manage to get my first ringer this year though, and Carson and I did beat Danny and Dallen twice in a row (I am choosing to forget the fact that they beat us twice the day before)

Some other highlights of the reunion include: playing Scum with all the cousins, back up singing for Morgan's version of "Old Dan Dalton had a Farm," cow pie tossing contest, and of course all the FOOD!!!!

Unfortunately Carson and I had to leave the reunion a little early so that we could move everything out of our apartment by 8:00 Monday morning to get new carpet. This only makes about the billionth time that we have had to move our couches and crazy heavy entertainment center.

But we love our new carpet.

A Fun Day at the Lake!!!

2011-07-11T18:27:00.007+01:00

Last weekend Carson and I got to go bass fishing with 2 of his uncles, and 2 cousins. We had such a good time!! And guess who won the fishing contest between us???

ME!!

Yep I out-fished the master (or at least that what he says he was before his mission). Anyway I caught 2 good size fish, and all Carson caught was one little excuse for a fish. Actually I caught 3 fish because when we started to fillet my bigger one, the first slit on the back of his neck caused him to spew out a little fish right on the table. We also got to do some fun tubing mixed in with the fishing. All in all it was a great day.

My Big FISH!!!

Carson struggling to get back in the boat.

Carson and I riding on the tube.

Uncle Kent (aka our Skipper)

I tried to upload a video of one of the tubing crashes, but it would never finish loading. Carson and Michael were hard-core on the tubes though. They kept egging Kent on by saying things like, "oh that one was so slow we finally got bored and jumped off." Well Kent sure gave them some wild rides, and the whole time Michael would just keep saying, "faster, faster."

4th of July

2011-07-06T01:36:00.002+01:00

Carson and I had a really fun 4th of July. First we went to a parade where we had more fun watching the kids chase after candy than watching the actual parade. Then we played Megan and Andrew in basketball. I would tell you that we won, but we probably didn't. It was close at first, but then Andrew kinda stepped it up, and well... we will just blame the loss on the height disadvantage. Then we had a super yummy dinner with jalapeno poppers, hot dogs, strawberries, and homemade fries. Megan and Andrew also made homemade ice cream, but for some reason it never really hardened up. We're talking hours of the little electric ice cream maker cranking away, and we still had to drink the ice cream. It was still very yummy. Then we headed off to watch the fireworks. They were not the best fireworks I have ever seen, and for some reason the town shoots them off from a low spot rather than a hill or something, so you can't see them very well, but I still love seeing them, it is not the 4th of July without them.

This is when Carson and Andrew put the little car track around Alex's little bouncer, but then they would hold his hands up so that he could not play with them because he kept stopping the cars. Ha Ha!!

Megan adding more ice and salt to the ice cream maker, even though it didn't seem to help.

Carson and Andrew carrying the jogging stroller up a steep hill so we could watch the fireworks from a little higher spot.Watching the fireworks!!!

Yellowstone

2011-06-29T21:53:00.008+01:00

Carson and I got to go to Yellowstone for the family reunion on his mom's side. I love getting together with family!! It is always interesting to observe the unique personalities of everyone in a family. For example, Grandma is determined to see everything, I hope I still have that much energy and drive when I am her age. Danny gets really grouchy when he has to ride in a car for 2 days straight. Dallen however can sleep for hours in a car.Traveling with family also get interesting, because no matter how well intended everyone is to keep to the schedule, it always takes longer than planned to load everyone in the cars, even if they were ready on time. One thing that saved the day however was a little book called, "Chicken in the Headlights" (the audio version of course). I was nervous about bringing it along because I knew that if a certain member of the family did not like it, they would not let me hear the end of it. Luckily everyone loved it, and we were even able to lend it to another family, and they also loved it. So if you want some lighthearted fun on a long road trip, you should definitely listen to this book, the narrator does such a good job. Anyway we saw lots of stinky geysers, buffalo, and elk. Unfortunately no bears or moose decided to grace us with their presence. Though we did see plenty of stuffed ones in Jackson Hole, along with lots of other cool things like fossils, wood carvings, and raccoons in canoes. We even got to go to a cowboy ranch dinner, and though the yodeling was not really our taste, other parts of the show were great.

Some of the many buffalo that we saw.

Old Faithful!!

Playing football with the cousins.

Jackson Hole

Before we left if I would tell anyone that I was going to Yellowstone they would say, "Oh yeah Yellowstone is great." I started to get the feeling that I was one of the few people in the world who had never been to Yellowstone. Now I can officially say that I have been to Yellowstone, and yes it is lots of fun.

1 YEAR!!!!

2011-06-29T21:04:00.003+01:00

Yep it's been one year since I married my best friend!!! Well it has actually been over a year, but since we celebrated late, my post is late. We wanted to do something fun for our anniversary so we decided to head to Provo and hit Seven Peaks on our way to a family reunion at Yellowstone (post to come). I had never been to Seven Peaks before, and I have to admit I was scared of some of the slides. Carson kept teasing me that I had to do the scariest looking ones first, but I insisted on easing into the intensity. Anyway it was lots of fun, and I even braved every slide except one called Jagged Edge. It was this straight down slide, and after doing the other slides that were super similar, I was tired of having water spayed in my face the entire duration of the slides, and large red marks on my back from the slides. There was this crazy scary ride called Boomerang. It is basically a giant U and you get in a tube and fly down it, then up, then down and so on... These cute kids were in line in front of us, I think they were siblings, a boy about 13 or so and a little girl about 10. She was starting to get really scared when they got to the top, but you could tell he did not want to back out, so he just kept telling her it wasn't scary. And here I am terrified just like a 10 year old thinking I should just walk back down with the little girl and let Carson and the boy go together. But the little girl braved the ride, and so did I. It was fun, but super scary too. Even after I had done it, I would still look up at it and think, "I couldn't do that one." Unfortunately there are no pictures of us doing any of the fun slides because in order to get fun pictures one of us would have had to sit out.

Mmmmmm doesn't he look good???

Then we ate dinner at the best place ever....

I also introduced Carson to Sub Zero, one of the best ice cream places ever. They make your ice cream right in front of you with cream and liquid nitrogen. So cool!!!

Carson also got eaten by a dinosaur.

It was a great anniversary trip, and it has been a great year!!! Heres to an eternity more.....

2011-06-17T05:36:00.003+01:00

I love being a twin!! Always have!!! Always will!!! People used to ask Megan and I if we liked being twins, and if you really think about it, we can't really answer that question objectively since we have never not been twins. But even if I had ever experienced not being a twin, I think I would still say I love being a twin. Think about it, I have someone to share clothes with (especially a bonus if like me, you don't think you have the best fashion sense in the world). I always have someone to talk to and hang out with. Someone who's opinion I trust about movies, books, recipes ect.... And most importantly I have one of the best BEST friends anyone could ask for.

We have always been linked in a special way. We did not share a bedroom when we were in high school, but still if Megan couldn't sleep, neither could I. Even as Megan and I grow up, and start to separate our lives, we go and marry guys with practically the same last name (as if having our husbands mix us up isn't enough). And Carson will tell you how annoying it is to have your wife get carsick everywhere you go because her twin sister is pregnant (so glad that is over).

When we were in high school Megan and I used to pack the same track clothes to work out in, so then when we got out on the field we not only looked alike, but we were dressed alike. Funny how no one believes that it was totally not planned. Well we had another one of those moments today. Carson and I headed over to Megan and Andrew's for a presentation...and as soon as I walked in the door I noticed that Megan and I were wearing the same shorts.

Maybe she doesn't LOVE being twins with me though, because right after the picture was taken she ran upstairs to change her clothes so that we would not be wearing the same thing during the presentation.

Oh well I still love being a twin!!!

Our New Place!!

2011-05-18T05:21:00.005+01:00

Carson and I have been crazy busy the last 2 weeks. We became apartment managers, so we packed up all our stuff and started moving. On top of that we had to clean a few apartment including our own, made a quick trip to Moab where we hiked to some really cool indian ruins, came back home, where Carson had finals, and I had graduation. Thru all of this we had a few interesting moments...

Carson dumpster diving because I threw away his newspaper
Finding a statue of Christ at DI for $2.00
Finding an entertainment center at DI for $25.00
Moving our couches about a million times
Losing a bocce ball in the creek and walking in freezing cold water to find it
Dallen finding the bocce ball!!!!!
Losing another bocce ball
Turning my hands purple from washing marked quarters
Trying to cook plantains for the first time
Totally failing at cooking plantains
Found out that there is no shortcut from Oak City
And found out which dryer does not work in our laundry room

So you see we have been very busy, but now we are all moved in and loving our new place. Even though it is not very big, it is twice the size of any other place that we have lived yet so it feels like a mansion.

Our Bedroom

Kitchen with green counter tops

(Carson does not like them, but I don't think they are that bad)

Living room

Bathroom (more green counter tops)

And my beautiful new clock that was a present from my siblings for my graduation in its new home (thanks guys). My walls are a little bare, but I am working on that.

And the totally unrelated apple pie that I made because we had tons of apples

Blessed

2011-05-17T05:08:00.000+01:00

(Monticello Utah Temple)

Carson and I were really struggling with what we should do this summer. We were not sure we would be able to find jobs here, but we weren't sure if moving to Moab was the right thing either. We weighed a few options, and thought we had found what we should do. We went to the temple one afternoon to be sure we had the right answer. As we sat in the temple together, neither of us felt that what we had decided was right. We were no closer to knowing what we should do, but we knew the Lord was mindful of us, and we left feeling much more peace then when we had gone in. On our way home Carson stopped at a random gas station to grab a paper to read that night at work. In it he found an employment ad for apartment managers. We applied as soon as we could, and at the interview we were hired right on the spot. We finally knew what we should do this summer. It is so great to have reassurance that the Lord is watching out for us, and to have a temple so close that we can go to when we need help.

Graduation!!!

2011-05-14T03:08:00.006+01:00

I did it!!! I graduated. Thanks to everyone who came to share the special day with me!!!

The Business Blues Band.

(the dean and 3 professors, so cool)

I have to say after all this hard work the alumni association made it worth all the effort by giving each graduate one giant.....

chocolate ice cream cone!!!!!

(Carson also took me out for ice cream as my graduation gift so the 4 years of lectures, homework, papers, and tests were totally worth it)

Carson's New Toy!!

2011-05-14T03:02:00.000+01:00

Carson is spoiled rotten!! Look what he got!!

(he got a really good deal though, and I guess he deserves it)

Snowboarding

2011-04-18T18:11:00.003+01:00

We got to go snowboarding on Saturday. It was the first time Megan could go with us so we were way excited. Andrew is a little more experienced than the rest of us, but Carson and I have gotten lots better this year. We were even attempting jumps by the end of the day (well I am not really sure you can call mine an attempt). Megan was a first timer. She did awesome, although she may be pretty sore now. I am hoping that we get to go one more time before the season ends, but since life is pretty busy right now I don't know if it will happen, oh well it was fun while it lasted. On a completely unrelated note,I am super excited that it is warming up.

March Madness!!

2011-03-31T17:48:00.005+01:00

March has gone by so fast. Carson works and goes to school. I just work. And we both play!!!! Around the 17th the leprechauns struck, and we were left with green milk for quite a while. We also got to see lots of family when everyone came for Alex's baby blessing. We had a great weekend with everyone. There was a BBQ, swimming, games, and other fun all weekend.

On Monday after blessing, Carson and I headed up to Brian Head to teach Stacy, Parker, and Payton how to snowboard. It was a challenging day for some, but we had fun. I am posting a video of Stacy going down because at one point in the day she stated that she was too old for snowboarding, well the video is proof that she can do it. Carson and I both felt pretty bad for Stacy because she did not get as much instruction as the kids since they needed a little extra help. I must say though I have a new respect for the instructors that I work with. And of course we cannot forget about the time spent with Jimmer and the rest of the BYU team this month. Megan and Andrew would come over and we would watch the games together, I am glad that the team did so well this year. And now for our other exciting news... Carson and I get to go to conference this weekend. We are way excited!!! I love conference. We are going to the Sunday morning session if anyone wants to look for us!

Happy Valentines Day!

2011-02-15T18:16:00.003Z

For Valentines Day this year Carson and I decided that we would get a photo book made of our wedding. So last week I spent 6 hours putting it together on mixbook.com. I was really fun, and it turned out super cute, everyone should come see it when it comes. I also made Carson a heart shaped brownie to go with his Valentine card and candy. It is a good thing I took a picture of it in advance because he wanted to eat it right when he saw it. Carson surprised me with a chocolate milkshake, which he had to carry while riding his bike (I was quite impressed). It was a great day!!!

What We've Been Up To!!!

2011-02-04T18:49:00.003Z

Carson and I have been busy with lots of things lately. I have been working at Brianhead, and Carson has two little jobs and school. We manage to stay busy most nights with FHE, istitute, raquetball, hanging with Megan and Andrew,or whatever fun things we can come up with to do. I got to try out skiing for the first time last week. (my job is great). I was surprisingly good for my first time, probably due to the fact that I can snowboard. It was such a blast. I can't wait till we have a free Saturday so Carson and I can both go play in the snow. We have also spent lots of time playing with this little guy. He is so cute!!! In the second picture Carson said he was trying to look like Alex. Who do you think looks goofier???

Happy Birthday Carson!!!

2011-01-07T18:17:00.002Z

Happy Birthday to Carson!!! This year Carson had a fishing birthday. I made him a fish cake, and decorated the house with little paper fish. Then there was a scavenger hunt for him to find his present. It was really funny watching him look for the clues, and along the way he found some goldfish snacks and some bait. Then finally he found his new shiny red, open reel, 6 ft pole. Megan and Andrew came over for his party where we had pizza, cake and ice cream, then watched Despicable Me. I hope he had a great birthday.

Holidays!!!

2011-01-07T17:40:00.003Z

Carson and I were so excited to spend our first Christmas together. We went to Moab as soon as I got off work on the 22nd. It was a bit crazy going from family to family trying to make sure we spent time with both of them, but we had tons of fun. We made gingerbread houses with my family, spent a day tubing with Carson's family, played lots of games, and ate lots of yummy food throughout the week. We had dinner at Carson's grandpa's house on Christmas Eve, then we went to a birthday party for Andrew later that night. Andrew likes to pick a new cake recipe every year for Megan to try. This year it was very chocolatey and very yummy. We spent Christmas morning opening presents and playing games with Carson's family. Then later we headed to my parents house for more presents and our big Christmas dinner. We had to head back to Cedar the next day after church so that I could be back to work by Monday. When we got home to Cedar City we got to have Christmas number 3 with each other. Carson now has a new camelbak bladder and some fishing stuff, and I have lots of new cake decorating stuff. We also got two new games, so if anyone wants to come play with us and eat cake, we would love it.

I'm DONE!!!!!!!

2010-12-11T02:50:00.003Z

I am finally done!!! I took my last final today. I studied lots, and still felt like the final was pretty hard. Cumulative finals should be illegal, especially since the teacher does not give the previous tests back, so anything I missed before, I am sure I missed again. Oh well, I am DONE!!!!!! I won't walk for graduation till May though, but it is really nice to be DONE.

The Formal

2010-12-01T17:49:00.003Z

The weekend before Thanksgiving Carson and I got to go to the institute formal. First we went to the matinee movie to see the new Harry Potter, it was really good, although Carson who hasn't read the books, kept asking me who all the characters were throughout the movie. He has seen all the other movies, but I guess it was still a bit confusing. Then we hurried home to get all dressed up. First there was a dinner, then a very packed dance in the Great Hall. We didn't stay at the dance very long, but we still had lots of fun getting dressed up.

This year Carson and I spent Thanksgiving here in Cedar. We started cooking in the morning while we watched the Macy's parade, then somehow Carson convinced me to go running with him (it was freezing). Around 1:00 we ate a great dinner at Carson's grandparent's house. Then only about 2 hours later we had another dinner at Megan's with her and Andrew, Nathan and Tonya and family, and my parents. All the food was great, and then we spent the afternoon playing games. It was a great Thanksgiving. The next morning Carson and I got up super early... no not to go shopping... to head down to Moab where we spent the weekend playing games, watching football, trimming trees, and getting a Christmas tree for Carson's family. It was a super fun weekend. Now we are back in Cedar, after a long and snowy drive home. It is the last week of classes before finals week, and we are sure feeling it. We spend our nights working to finish major projects and studying finals. We did put our tree up on Monday, it looks great. I will probably post pictures soon, but I need to wait for Stacy to bring me the rest of our ornaments. And today we get to start my favorite tradition: reading our book of Christmas stories.

Fish Tales!!!

2010-11-08T20:45:00.002Z

Carson was so excited when him and Dallen went fishing and they caught these!!!! There is a new lake here and it has been well stocked with large catfish, and both albino and regular trout. The albino trout look really cool, but they are fiesty, they jump in and out of the water the whole time while you reel them in. Anyway these were the big catches for the day. It's the biggest fish Carson has every caught at a whopping 18.5 inches. Dallen's was 18 inches. After he caught it he called to tell me, then he called me later when he had gotten home to ask where the camera was so that he could take a picture of his prize catch. He did find out that the guy next to them had caught a 24 inch fish, so we will probably be going back to try for some bigger ones.

Halloween Fun!!

2010-10-29T21:05:00.004+01:00

We decorated sugar cookies with Megan and Andrew the other day. We had lots of fun, and the cookies were very yummy. We also found out that Carson is very creative, though not conventional at all. Can you guess which cookies he decorated?

We also had a lot of fun carving pumpkins. I did a mummy this year, and it was pretty complex and took FOREVER. Next year I will be choosing something easier. Carson did 2 carvings on his pumpkin because the rest of us were taking so long.

Birthday Fun!!

2010-10-29T20:32:00.004+01:00

My Birthday was tons of fun this year. Carson was so sweet and he tried so hard to make it the best birthday. On Saturday night we went to Winger's with Megan and Andrew for a birthday dinner, then had a pumkin carving party. On my actual birthday Carson and I made a yummy breakfast together, then I got to open presents. Carson got me a silver watchband, Home Alone 2, and some stuff to do cookie decorating. Then we went to church together. My Mom came on Sunday to stay here in Cedar temporarily while she does her radiation, so her and Megan and Andrew came over to our apartment for a big chicken fried steak dinner and some games. We played a new game called Pirate's Cove, and it was lots of fun. Carson is ruthless and he won both times (but I did beat him once when we played again). Andrew also made Megan and I a yummy brownie cake. It was a great Birthday. There is also a picture of the cake that I made Dallen for his birthday yesterday.

I love FALL!!!

2010-10-19T18:55:00.006+01:00

Fall is the prettiest time of year! I love the leaves changing to beautiful colors and the perfect weather. I love all of the fall and Halloween decorations. I love the festive food and getting my jackets out for the coming cold. And we can't forget that my birthday is in the fall, and fall also starts out the fun assembly of all the best holidays: it is just the best time of year.

Last week Carson and I drove up to cedar breaks to see all of the fall colors, it is just so pretty.

Other things we have been up to lately include: job hunting, school, the hot air balloon festival, trying out the fishing at some new lakes, and spending time with Megan and Andrew. We had a great time camping with them last week at 3 Peaks. Carson and I won the bocce ball tournament, although I didn't contribute much to the winning, luckily Carson is pro. My new obsession is rock climbing though. Carson had a rock climbing class, and so we would go to the climbing wall on campus a few times a week. I love to try the new routes, and gradually progress to harder ones.

We also dipped carmel apples with Megan and Andrew. They were very messy, and I think we will probably change a few things next time we do it, but of course we still had lots of fun.
I am going to try to be better at blogging, but since we do not have internet at our apartment, blogging gets quite limited.

Timp Caves

2010-08-17T17:16:00.005+01:00

The first weekend in August, Carson and I headed up north for Carson's mission President's homecoming. We decided to make a fun weekend out of it by starting with Timp Caves. We bought our tickets ahead of time, but then unfortunately we got there 45 minutes late. They give you an hour and a half to hike up to the cave entrance, and we had to go pretty fast in order to make it by our tour time. We didn't stop to rest a single time, so we were a little sweaty and tired by the time we got to the top. The caves were way cool, and it was fun to hear all the history of how they were found. Our tour was with a whole group of really excited kids, but lucky for us their parents insisted that the other 4 of us a the group go first for everything, so we got to be front row for everything. There was a fun story about the drips in the cave, if one hits you they say that you got kissed by the cave and you will have good luck. One lady in our group looked up and got kissed in the eye. We decided that was worth double the luck. The rest of the weekend we spent doing a little bit of shopping, going to see Toy Story 3, having lunch at Mountain Mike's Pizza with my China friends, and going to the homecoming BBQ. It was fun to meet some of Carson's mission companions. The homecoming sacrament meeting was great, there were tons of missionaries there, and they had them all get together and sing their mission song. It sounded awesome, and it was a way fun weekend.

This is supposed to look like a St. Bernard. We could see it in the cave, but not anymore.

A New Look!

2010-08-04T18:29:00.002+01:00

So on Sunday Carson comes out of the bathroom looking like this. He had started shaving, and decided that he wanted to try some new things. (The picture is not great, but it gives you an idea) Anyway being Carson, he of course could not decide whether or not he wanted to keep it that way. I told him that it looked "Cool" and that he could keep it that way if he wanted, but that was not good enough for him, he wanted me to tell him yes or no. After much debate I asked him how he even gets dressed in the mornings and he told me that he can make decisions just fine if I am not around, my response,"Well then pretend I am not here." He did finally decide to leave it so this is his new look for now. However we did discover that I am the reason he is so un-decisive. Maybe I can get him to decide my next hair style for me... probably not.

CAMPING!!!

2010-07-28T19:01:00.002+01:00

For the 24th of July weekend Carson and I decided to go camping. We left Thursday night and headed to Medicine Lake. That night we took a very LONG 4-wheeler ride over to my family's cabin where Megan and Andrew were having his family reunion, to take them their forgotten propane take and shot gun shells. We played games there for a while, then headed back to camp very late at night. The next day Carson went out to look for bucks because he takes his hunts very serious, it is never too soon to know where they are at. Anyway while he was just plopped down looking through his binoculars at a hillside, a mountain lion stumbled across him. Carson quickly stood up (you know to add the intimidation factor) and they had a stare down for a bit. It wasn't until Carson said something that the lion decided he'd had enough of looking at this strange creature and he took off. When Carson got back we started out for our hike up Mt. Peale. We started at about 10,000ft elevation, and the very top of the peak is about 12,721ft. Let me tell you, from the bottom it doesn't look that high. We opted not to use the trail and just go for the more straight up approach. The only bad thing about that is when you are almost to what you think looks like the top, you get high enough to see the next peak that you have to climb to get to the top, and then sadly this happens again when you get to the top of that peak. Not to mention the fact that the slide rock starts sliding more as you get higher, so every once in a while when you are going really good, your footing just slides out and you lost all momentum (and motivation). Since we could see a storm coming in we had to move pretty fast if we were going to get to the top and back down before it hit. The hike up took us a record time of 2 hours and 10 minutes (at least if felt like record time to me). We did manage to make it up and almost all the way down before the rain started, so we just got a little wet. The pictures are us climbing, us as the top, and the little guy that followed us down (he wasn't too keen on our jalapeno flavored chips). Carson's parents met us up there with their trailer that night, and the rest of the trip included fishing, 4-wheeling, and getting caught in the rain. On 2 nice notes: I beat Carson in the fishing contest, and our tent is completely waterproof ;-)

A New Beginning!!!

2010-06-29T18:54:00.004+01:00

I have been meaning to get this post up for a while, but life is pretty crazy, so it has taken me a few weeks. The wedding went great, and now I am married to my best friend Carson for eternity. I still catch myself wondering if it is all real sometimes. We fell in love so long ago, and after 4 year, 2 of them especiall long for me, we are finally married. I love Carson so much! I was so happy with the way the decorations and everything turned out for the wedding. A big thanks to everyone who helped. We went to Palm Springs for our honeymoon. We had tons of fun at the zoo, air museum, and the food fest. We also took trips to the beach and Disneyland. Carson unfortunately got super sunburned, so the trip could have been a little better for him. After moving into our little apartment, we spent a few days there, then we headed over to St. George for a fun family reunion. The reunion was for Carson's Mom's side. I knew some of them previously, but it was still a challenge trying to keep everyone straight all weekend. We had lots of fun, and then on the way home we stopped in Spring City to go to Kayla and Kendra's baby blessings. They are so cute and fun to play with. Then we came back to Moab for some more family fun as my Mom's sisters started arriving for Tori's wedding. We took my cousins and Uncle to Left Hand for a fun filled afternoon. My 9 year old cousin Hunter is way into sports, so he had a great time throwing a soccer ball to me when I would jump off the rocks. It took me a few trys, but I got a lot of cheers when I made the first and only successful catch of the day. There was a young mens group there that tried it out with a football, but they did not have great timing. Tori's wedding went great as well, and I was really glad that I got to spend so much time with family members that we don't see very often. Tori and Adam have already been spotted in Vegas, hopefully they are having a great time. Of course life is not going to slow down yet though, this weekend we have another family reunion for the Dalton side. There has not been a dull moment since the wedding, and hopefully life always stays that way:-)

Ooops!!

2010-06-02T06:17:00.001+01:00

Now Carson is sick. Poor guy. This nasty bug seems to be circulating thru my family. On a positive note, at least it is a short term thing!

He Must Really Love Me...

2010-05-31T14:59:00.002+01:00

I knew that at some point after we were married Carson would see me in some pretty low points. The key word is AFTER. There are a few states that I would have liked to avoid at least until we were married and he was stuck with me. Well I thought he had seen the worst for now a few weeks ago when he took Stacy and I to have our skin grafts done. Sitting in Walmart swollen, bloody, and dribbling chocolate milk down myself had to be a low point... until yesterday. I had to leave church because I was not feeling well, after stopping by Carson's house for some paint reliever we barely made it to the parking lot of the park before I took 3 steps and lost everything right there behind some poor persons car. Carson was very nice and patient as he stood there and watched me in my multiple episodes as I ejected impressive amounts of... well you know. Worst of all, we couldn't seem to leave because when we would try to get back in the car, I would start all over again. It was terrible!!! We finally made it home, and Carson was so nice to sit with me for hours in my grossness. And you know what else??? He still wants to marry me!!! Yep, he must really love me.

PS: I feel much better now, and I am getting super excited for this weekend!!!!!

Changes!!!

2010-04-19T01:41:00.002+01:00

Changes in life sure are interesting. Some are good, some are bad, some seem bad, but then turn out to be good. Some people like change, and some people really dislike change, but it is inevitable nonetheless. I have had some big changes in my life happen in the last few weeks. My mom was diagnosed with cancer and has started chemotherapy. I love my mom, she is such a trooper and is doing great. The other major change was getting engaged to my best friend Carson. He pretended that we were going geocaching and took me up a hill overlooking Moab right around sunset. Then we started looking for the cache, but for some reason we couldn't find it ;-) All the sudden I hear Carson say, " I found it." I started hiking down to where he was, and as I was climbing down a little ledge to where he was, he pulled out a little black ring box and asked me to marry him. We are getting married June 5th in the Monticello temple. Whenever we tell people the date they say oh that is soon, but it still feels far away to us. Currently I am busy working on wedding plans while trying to survive the last 2 weeks of school. A cumulative final where the teacher does not give your previous tests back is just cruel!!! After I finish school, and attend Megan's graduation (YAY Megan), I am off to Moab for the summer.
Mom, Dad, and Carson came to visit this weekend for my Beta Sigma Gamma honors organization induction. The dinner was good, but the awards part was a bit long. We had a great weekend with great weather!!! We played in the park, watched movies, and played games together. Now I just have some major studying to do before finals. Wish me luck!!!

Bumps and Bruises!!!

2010-03-29T03:34:00.002+01:00

This weekend Carson came to visit me here in Cedar City. We did a yummy fried chicken dinner on Friday night with a very yummy sweet and sour sauce that I got a recipe for from work and wanted to try. We also made cookies and watched a movie, it was a great night. We stayed up way too late though, and we regretted it the next day when we had to get up early for the "Hearts for Haiti" 3 mile race. It was very cold and icy, but we did it nonetheless. Carson was nice and ran with me the whole way (even though he could have gone much faster), he did push me a bit, and I ended up taking third out of the girls and won ten bucks. After that we headed to St. George for a fun filled day. We didn't really have anything planned, but as we were running a few errands that Carson had, we saw a large tent off in the distance. We decided to head over to see what it was, and we found the "Dixie Igloo." A spur of the moment decision had us putting on our own pairs of ice skates. We were not great at first, but we did manage to get the hang of just gliding around the rink in large circles. That is when our tiny bit of confidence led to a very bad decision. Note to self: amateur skaters should not attempt to play tag, I have a bruise on my hip and a LARGE bump on my head to prove it. We did have lots of fun though. That night we had a great dinner at Applebee's (my favorite), ice cream from Baskin Robbins, and then a trip to the 2 dollar theater to see Blindside. It was an EXCELLENT movie that I would recommend to anyone. Today was a nice warm day so after church we had a yummy pizza picnic on the grass outside. It was a super fun weekend. Hopefully the weather stays nice; I love the sun!!!

Spring Break!!!

2010-03-22T04:01:00.005Z

I haven't blogged in a while, so to update: the triathlon went really well. I ended up placing third out of the girls, and it was tons of fun. Now on to SPRING BREAK!!!!
Spring break of course was spent in Moab... is there any other place to go???
I started off the week by hiking in Arches with Carson's family. We had a super yummy dinner at the Moab Diner, and the next day Carson gave a great talk for his homecoming. He is such a great guy, and I am soooo happy he's home.
My China friends came down to Moab to visit me, and we had lots of fun. We did some shopping and hiking. We also did lots of eating, mostly thanks to my Dad literally shoving food at us, it was all super good. We played lot of games with my family, and watched a few movies too. I made super cute panda cupcakes for Keara's birthday, they tasted great too.Then on Saturday Megan and I ran in the Canyonlands Half Marathon. It was lots of fun, and thankfully I felt really good for most of the race, the last two miles were pretty tuff though. I was able to push myself pretty fast, and I ended up shattering my goal by quite a bit. I finished in an hour and 48 minutes, and according to the website, I ran an 8:15 pace (not too bad for 13 miles if you ask me). I finished 650th overall out of about 3300 people, and I placed 25th in my age group. I am so happy that I can now say I have done a half marathon, and I would do it again.
The most eventful part of the race had to have been right before the race when there are thousands of people waiting in line at about 30 pot-a-potties. Something about the start of a race makes me really nervous, and that makes me have to go the bathroom multiple times that morning (so much for trying to hydrate before the race). Megan and I got in line over 40 minutes before the race was supposed to start, but the lines were not moving very fast. As it got closer to the start time the announcer kept saying that we needed to start heading up the hill to the starting line. They also kept informing us that if we did not get our sweat bags in the trucks placed at the top of the hill, and halfway up the hill, we would be carrying our warm ups with us for the next 13 miles. At this point I just keep thinking I cannot run for the next 2 hours if they do not let me go to the bathroom first. Megan and I started stripping down while still standing in line to pack our sweat bags even though it was still super cold. At this point many people start giving up on the lines and head up the hill to the start. Not me, I was determined. We finally get to the front of the line about the time that they are announcing that we have 2 minutes to get our sweat bags into the trucks. In perfect timing Megan and I run out of side by side port-a-potties, grab our bags, and start running up the hill as they are playing the "Call to the Post" in the background. Arriving at the top of the hill I saw the alternative restrooms that people choose to use, oh how nice it must be to be a guy.

We topped off the night with a bon fire at the sand dunes. Luckily I have not been sore at all since the race. Carson spoke again in my ward on Sunday and he did a great job again. After church I sadly had to head back to Cedar City for more tests and papers. It was a great week, I had so much fun playing with my family and friends, and not doing any homework!!!!

Carson is Home!!!

2010-03-04T05:42:00.007Z

Last week I took off three days of school to head home to Moab and visit my best friend in the world who is finally home from a mission in Peoria Illinois. We pretty much spent every minute together the entire week. Carson taught me how to play frisbee golf at the new course in Moab. I was not very good, but we had lots of fun. We played with my niece and nephew, watched movies, worked on putting snow tracks on a 4-wheeler (I was not much help), played games, had a picnic in the park, and went hiking with my family. I even beat Carson at chess, a rare occurrence before he left. The week ended with Parker's baptism. It was so fun to get to be there for my little buddy as he made this important step in his life. Congratulations Bud!!!

I had such a fun week, but sadly now I am back in Cedar City (where it annoyingly snowed today) studying for tests and writing term papers. There is a window of hope in the future; spring break is only a week away. I can't wait!!!! My China friends are coming to play, I am so excited to see them again. Megan and I are also running in the half marathon at the end of the break, so that should be fun... I hope. I have never ran that far before so this will be a completely new challenge.

Megan and I are also doing an indoor triathlon this weekend at the school, also a new experience. It should be great training for the half marathon. It is running 3 miles, biking 10, and then swimming 1/4 mile. I am pretty nervous for the swimming part though, I am not a great swimmer.

MASQUERADE!!!

2010-02-01T04:43:00.008Z

I know I have not blogged for a while, but I finally have something blog-worthy to blog about!!! This weekend I went to a Masquerade with my friends from China (and some of their way cool friends). Oh how I missed them!!! Megan was nice enough to let me borrow a dress, and to curl my hair for me- Thanks Megan. And Keara was nice enough to make me an awesome mask-Thanks Keara. None of us had dates, but we danced the night away nonetheless. Even without a date, I thought it was really fun to watch the other couples on the slow and swing dances, they were soooo cute, and really good dancers. There were some way cool masks thereAfter the dance ended we headed to Keara's house for the night. Keara's family is lots of fun. There I was truly fascinated to learn all about Quaker Parrots and how emotional they are. Poor Sarge, he has had a tough life. Then Chelsey, Keara, and Brittany introduced me to "Chick Fillet," and boy was it good. That night we went bowling with Chelsey's parents (they are so cute). Chelsey's Dad creamed us!!! Then we went to "Sub Zero," only the best ice cream place on the planet!!! Yes it was January, and yes it was snowing outside!!! Would you call us a little Strange?? Maybe, but we were definitely not the only one's eating ice cream on that particular cold January night. The next day I went to Chelsey's home ward with her to listen to her speak about her experience in China. She gave a great talk, and I am so glad that I got to be there to hear her speak, especially since I had lived everything that she talked about. In Relief Society the president found out that I had gone to China with Chelsey, and they started calling us the "China Dolls."

I had such a fun weekend. It was great to see Chelsey and Keara again, and to make new friends. We missed Becca!! I hope I get to see them all again soon!

It's a New Year!!!

2010-01-07T04:29:00.000Z

I had a great Christmas and New Years!! It is really good to be back in the states with my family. I was rather lost for a week or two after getting back. I miss my China friends so much, and I feel incomplete without them. At first I kept thinking of funny inside jokes, or memories from China, but just as I was about to say them, I would realize that no one that I was with would have any idea what I was talking about so I just had to keep all my thoughts to myself. I really enjoyed getting to play with my family, and I am not so lost anymore. I got to work over the break out at the potash plant, (or ash pot as Parker called it). It was a little cold, but I love working out there, the people are great. Christmas was great, especially the food!!! I had lots of fun buying gifts for everyone in China and I hope everyone liked their gifts. I did bust out the chicken feet at Christmas dinner, and there were a few souls who were brave enough to try them. The packaged ones are not as good as the fresh ones, but they did smell like China. (See previous post) I learned tons of new games from my family over the break and we would play until way late into the night (not the best remedy for getting over jet lag). New Years was fun filled with friends, Kim Call's homemade donuts, gummy worms, and a movie. Parker and Payton got so big while I was gone, I played with them as much as I could over the break. We had fun making sugar cookies, dying paper, and just hanging out. I sure was sad to say goodbye to them, and all of my family.

Now I am back in Cedar City after just 2 short weeks at home. I am having trouble getting back into school, mostly just the fact that I actually have to do homework and reading at night. I really like school and my classes though, so I will hopefully be able to adjust to the homework and stuff real soon. I love being able to hang with Megan and Andrew whenever I want, we have already made our arms very sore playing racquetball. Since being here I have already been in 2 earthquakes, ran over 18 miles, and killed my toenail again (what is wrong with me?)

I am usually not a fan of New Years resolutions, but this year I did actually make a few, and I am going to post them with the hopes that it will help motivate me to keep them.

Cut back on sugary foods. Since I come from a family of diabetics, it would probably be a good idea for me to stop giving in to my sweet tooth so much.

Exercise at least 5 if not 6 times a week. I am doing great on this one so far since Megan and I are training to run the half marathon in the spring.

Study (not just read) my scriptures everyday.

Good Luck to anyone else who made resolutions this year!!!!

Do You Like CHICKEN FEET???

2010-01-07T03:39:00.000Z

WeLcOmE hOmE!!!!

2009-12-18T23:38:00.010Z

After many many hours of traveling, I am back in the USA!! The first thing that we did was head to Chuck-a-Rama for some great food. It is great to be back, and I am having a blast hanging out with my family and getting ready for Christmas.

I already miss the other girls!!! I can't wait to see them again.

SPECTACLE!!!

2009-12-15T18:45:00.006Z

We did it, we actually survived SPECTACLE. We have been preparing for almost 2 months now for our big end of semester program. The kids have been diligently learning dances and English songs along with actions everyday for weeks. They were pretty good sports about it too, even though I am sure they wanted to just throw the props at me every time that I said, "Ok, we have to sing it one more time before we can go to snack." The kids are not the only ones who had to prepare though, the teachers and I also had to perform a dance at the program, and I had a piano solo as well. Why all this work you might ask... Well let's just say that the Chinese are very into presentation. These kids are 4, 5, and 6, and they cannot help the fact that they are these ages, besides the little mess ups that occur just add to the cuteness. Well we think so anyway, but the Chinese teachers don't necessarily agree, and they forced us to work the kids until they could do their skits perfectly. My class sang frosty the snowman, and they did a great job, I was so proud of them. There was also a fashion show featuring the younger class, it was cute beyond description. My family will be forced to watch the movie with me, and also forced to listen to a description of all of the kids little personality quirks...whether they want to or not. Today I had the unfortunate experience of having to say goodbye to my 37 new little friends. Who would have thought that in 4 months we would get so attached to all of their cute little faces? We had a slide show prepared that we watched with the kids, and then the tears started flowing. Some of the kids are old enough to understand that we are leaving, and it was way sad to see them cry about it. The other kids got way confused, they did not understand why all of their teachers were crying, but they were quick to give hugs to try to fix the problem.

For our last night here in Xiaolan we had a big dinner at a nice restaurant with the Principal and some of the Chinese teachers. The food was super good, and there was Karaoke afterward featuring lots of Michael Jackson. It was a great way to end our stay. Tomorrow we start our never-ending journey home. We take a van to another school where we spend the night before taking a ferry to Hong Kong. At about 1:30 PM on Thursday we leave Hong Kong... our destination... the great US of A. We will arrive in LA California on Thursday at about 11:45 AM... yes we are going back in time!!! Too bad the 13+ hour flight couldn't really be negative 2 hours. Anyway eventually we will make it back to SLC where hopefully someone that I recognize will be there to pick me up. Then it is on to Cedar City for a weekend at Megan and Andrew's. I am super excited, I can't wait for all the family fun.

I have had such a great time in China, I still can't believe I have been living here for 4 months. This has been the experience of a lifetime, and I have had the chance to see so many cool places. I am going to miss so many things about China, mostly the kids, my new friends (why is SUU so far away?), the yummy food, and cheap shopping. I am super excited to see my family though, and to eat American food again. After traveling around for a good portion of 2009, I am ready to stay in the states for a while. I am looking forward to Christmas with my family, and getting back to Cedar City for school. Oh and running, I am looking forward to running again, you see none of the other teachers like to run, and since we are not allowed out alone, my running has been very restricted. Since Megan and I are planning on running the half marathon in March, I better get training.

On to my next adventure...

THANKSGIVING IN CHINA!!!

2009-12-07T22:02:00.001Z

I know this post is a little late, but better late than never.
We had a great Thanksgiving here in China. Oddly enough the Chinese do not eat turkey, they will eat just about any other animal, but there are no turkeys to be found. We had to teach on Thanksgiving, but as soon as we were done, the 3 girls that I share an apartment and I started Thanksgiving dinner #1. This dinner consisted of some microwaveable stuffing and turkey, mashed potatoes, beef and potatoes, and some chicken and pasta dish. Obviously we have been in China way too long because even these microwaveable meals tasted amazing to us.
Later that night we had Thanksgiving dinner #2. We invited the cook and his wife, the guard and his wife, Annie (our coordinator) and her boyfriend, and a few of the Chinese teachers. There were 18 of us total. We made some mashed potatoes, pumpkin cookies, corn bread, jello, pudding, stuffing, and even a pumpkin pie. Annie made some Chinese food too. After all the cooking was done the feast stared. Our Chinese friends were very hesitant to try the American food but we eventually got them to. Once they tried it they really liked it, especially the mashed potatoes. They were so happy that we had invited them to our Thanksgiving dinner.

Just a few of the things I am even more thankful for since coming to China:
Carpet
Soft couches
Milk
Boneless meat
Chocolate
Ok just American food in general!!
Normal showers
My family and friends
LDS.org
SKYPE
The cute kids we teach
Purified water systems
Only having to drive about 10 minutes to get to church
Cheap China shopping

ULTRAMAN!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-12-07T21:59:00.001Z

A post for my little buddy back in America. This is ULTRAMAN, he is the biggest Chinese action figure around. Why you might ask??—well his ability to make himself get bigger and bigger might have something to do with it.
In the series the Science Patrol is always ready to protect the Earth from rampaging monsters, but sometimes finds itself overmatched. When the situation becomes desperate, Hayata, the Patrol's most capable member, holds the key to salvation in the form of a power-object called a "Beta Capsule", which, when ignited, allows him to transform secretly into the amazing, super-humanoid-powered giant from space—Ultraman.

I hope Parker enjoys this, can't wait to see him in less than 2 weeks!!!

Yangshuo Vacation!!!

2009-11-28T00:48:00.004Z

Last weekend we went on a super fun vacation to Yangshuo. (A little side information about Yangshou. There are hills and mountains that pop up randomly everywhere; it is like living in Dr. Seuss world. We were so excited to see mountains again. Also they have a great mixture of Western and Chinese food. We would usually order something like a burger, and a Chinese dish, and then split up everything. It was great!) Ok on with the vacation…We took a sleeper bus, and ended up getting dropped off at a random street corner at 5:00 AM. We immediately ran into the con artists that our travel books warned us about. They tell you that they work for your hostel, or that they can get you tickets or tours to places, then they either try to sell you things, or they take you to fake destinations. The one we ran into actually almost got in a fight with the guy that was really trying to help us. Anyway we did make it to our hostel, and after some breakfast we rented bikes and started out for the caves. These are water caves so we climbed into a boat and they take you deeper into the cave. After a little tour of the cave we put on our swimming suits and were ready to play in the mud. The mud is not very deep, and it was pretty cold, but it was lots of fun to play in. After getting all nice and muddy, we were ready to hit the hot springs, and boy did they feel good. After the caves we grabbed lunch, and then headed off to hike to the center of moon hill. It was definitely colder in Yangshuo than it was in Xiaolan, so we were pretty cold and ready for a nice warm dinner after all the biking and hiking. The next day it was raining, but we were determined not to waste our vacation, so we did a bamboo raft tour in the rain. It was freezing!!! I am still glad we did it, but I would not have complained if it had only been half as long. That night we geared up with hats and gloves and coats so that we could tackle the rice terraces the next day. On our way to the terraces we stopped at the long haired village. They do a little show, and 4 lucky guys from the audience even have the chance to get married. Strange cultural quirk; in the village pinching someone’s bum means you love them, so we got pinched a lot, and let me tell you – they really go at it. Next we go on up to the rice terraces. It is a bit of hiking to get to the top, but since I love hiking, I did not mind at all. The hills look so cool; they are completely covered with terraces for farming. That night we decided to go dancing. Fact; Chinese guys cannot dance, but it is sure fun to watch them try. The Chinese get pretty excited about Americans, so they all wanted to get to dance with us. Guys kept offering us shots and beer, but we were just there to dance. Some guys even tried to get us up on the pole with them, but we were definitely not having any of that. Interestingly enough, the guys have no problem dancing on the pole with each other. It was a pretty funny night. The next day we rode a freezing cold sleeper bus for 13 hours and got back in Xiaolan around 1:00 in the morning very disappointed to find that it was just as cold as it had been in Yangshuo. Unfortunately we don’t have heat, so we now wear our coats, hats, and gloves all the time, even when we teach and sleep (it is really annoying). Pretty strange since just the week before we were in shorts with the AC on. Fun times in China!!

The Kids!

2009-11-13T18:13:00.007Z

The kids that we teach at the school are super cute. We teach 3 older classes, and 2 younger classes. It is really fun seeing all the different personality traits that

they have. In fact one of the number one topics that our conversations focus on is the kids and the funny things they do. (Well sometimes we exchange tales of the horrible things they do too)
The kids love to yell "Teacher, Teacher," and they run up and give us big hugs, or even group hugs where we feel like we are going to fall over. It is so fun.
We got to give all the new students English names when we started. Of course much ingenious planning went into the names, as we of course had to cover all Harry Potter characters, and there was even an attempt to get one kid named MJ for Michael Jackson. As time has gone by though, those well thought out names have been modified into little nicknames. For example:"Crazy Crack Crystal" (yes we think she is on crack), and the most famous, "Sweaty Sue." (Pictured above).Poor little Susan sweats constantly, more than any other kid, she will seriously have beads of sweat just rolling down her face when we are just sitting in class reading a story.
Most of the lessons just consist of playing with the kids while we make food or do crafts and such. Last week I even got a "you so good teacher," with a thumbs up, as we explored the wonders that food coloring and shaving cream will do on paper. It is fun to hear their English progress. It is also quite amusing to hear the funny... well we will just call them grammatically incorrect phrases.
For example, “I go buffalo teacher?”
Translation: May I go to the bathroom.
They are so fun, and I am going to miss them all when I go home.

A Well Balanced Breakfast!!

2009-11-09T18:31:00.000Z

Today we had house visits with some of the students in our classes. Becca and I trekked out early to meet 2 of the other Chinese teachers and be on our way. We were scheduled to meet with 5 students. We knew that there would be breakfast at the second house, and then lunch at the last house. With this in mind we stop at the first house where we are immediately offered a big bowl of miniature apples. To be polite we take some, and munch away not realizing at that time that we would not be allowed to leave the house until all of the apples were gone. We were also given chestnut soup in the middle of the apple munching, so we left the first stop already full as we headed off to breakfast with the next family. So now you will find out what the Chinese consider breakfast food. First off there are chicken feet, dumplings, beef balls, and bean paste filled steamed buns wrapped up lambus bread style. Oh and we cannot forget the carrot-apple puree, pistachio pastries, and bok choy (a cross between broccoli and celery). Then the meal was topped off with a nice steaming bowl of kidney and intestine soup. Yes we ate all of it: chicken feet, kidney, intestines and all (intestine is really chewy). We left feeling very full, and of course we were given more food at the other stops.

Happy Halloween!!!!

2009-11-01T22:31:00.002Z

Halloween here was awesome. We dressed up on Friday for classes with the kids. After teaching only 3 classes, we got our classes back, and once the bags were decorated the Trick-or-Treating started (or the madness as it is more accurately titled). It was so funny to listen to the kids try to say Trick-or-Treat, and they kept coming back over and over for more candy. Next we did the donut on a string game, a game that is a little lost on the Chinese because the donuts here leave a little to be desired. Anyway it was hilarious to watch the kids try to eat the donuts. Some of them were concentrating so hard, but they just could not manage to succeed at getting the donut into their mouths. There was a little sprinkling of sugar on top of the donuts, really not much at all, but the kids still managed to have sugar all over their faces. It was a really fun day.
That night we had the big party at the bond office with all the kids and their parents. The kids performed some songs we taught them, and then we performed “Thriller.” Then it was time for the main event… the Haunted House!!! We spent many afternoons for the last 2 weeks slaving away in the dusty rooms at the bond office building a SCARY Haunted House. This was quite a feat, considering the lack of human resources that we had, and the lack of physical resources that we had. For example, we asked for a strobe or a black light, they brought us Christmas lights. Anyway after much ingenuity, we created a truly scary experience. It was really fun getting to be in the haunted house scaring people, although I did get hit right in the face with a plastic sword by a very scared child. Our kids knew we were in there, and it was way sad to hear them say, “No teacher, no,” when they were scared.
Much of the fun happened after all the kids were gone, and we were headed home. You see Becca’s face was painted like the Joker, mine was pure black, Chelsey was a Zombie, and Keara was a skeleton. The Chinese do not celebrate Halloween, so they are not used to seeing strangely dressed people walking down the street. We got quite a kick out of sticking our faces silently in windows until the people turned. Of course many times we got the desired reaction of terror. Some people really did look terrified like they had seen a real ghost. After the initial scare we would wave, and be on our way (most times they would laugh and wave back). Then people would want pictures with us, and they would watch us to laugh when we scared other people. What is normally a half an hour walk home took us two hours. I hope everyone had a great Halloween!!!

Happy Birthday!!!

2009-10-27T21:05:00.001Z

HaPpY bIrThDaY!!!!

My birthday was great. I am not too excited to be getting older, but it is always fun to have an excuse to party. The girls here were so sweet and heart attacked my door. There were all sorts of fun quotes on the hearts, and they made me smile. The precious blueberry pancake mix was brought out for a special birthday breakfast, complete with American syrup and everything. I decided that I wanted us all to go swimming for my birthday, so we got all ready in our suits and everything jus to walk down to the pool and find out that it is not open between 8:00 AM and 4:30 PM. Aren’t those prime swimming hours? Anyway we camped out at a little Café for a few hours playing cards and eating banana splits until the pool opened. It turned out to be only lap swimming, which I didn’t mind, but the other girls were not thrilled about. So swimming turned out to be a bust. Next on the agenda was a visit to our Italian mafia friend at Little Italy. The pizza was heavenly!! After that we did birthday cake, and being the chocolate freak that I am we had to hit McDonalds for some hot fudge sundaes. The night ended watching "American Outlaws" (one of my favorites). It was a great birthday.

Beijing Vacation

2009-10-16T20:59:00.003+01:00

I just got back from one of the best vacations ever. Everyone should try to hit Beijing at some point. It was awesome.
The trip started off a bit rocky, but we knew it would considering the fact that we had to book standing tickets to Xian because of high demand during the week of the National Holiday. Have you ever stood on a train for 26 hours? I have!! And I have 2 words to say about it; NEVER AGAIN! It was horrible. There was not really any place for us to stand, so we were crammed into the very back of the train body to body with what felt like a hundred sweating Asians. Luckily people soon started to get off and we were able to get seats for about an hour or so at a time until more people got on. We eventually made friends with 2 hobo looking Asians in this little room at the very back of the train that was no bigger than a hallway where we camped out on their newspapers so we could get some sleep. We were all determined to not use the squatter on the train, so I did learn that I can go over 22 hours without going to the bathroom, unfortunately our train ride was 26 hours. Only 2 out of the 6 of us were successful. Looking back on it we all laugh, and we know we can stand just about anything now, but I will repeat NEVER AGAIN.
In Xian we got to walk between the 3 pits of the Terracotta Warriors while eating yummy pomegranates before heading to the Muslin Quarter. The Muslim quarter was really fun. There are streets just packed with little food stands (I don’t even know what half the foods were), and fun souvenir shops. After a day in Xian we reluctantly boarded another train, luckily this time we had seats. Thirteen hours later we were in Beautiful Beijing.
From the minute that we got to Beijing we loved it. It was cooler there than it is here in Zhongshan, but drier as well. In the desire to pack lightly none of us took any lotion because we don’t need it in Zhongshan. Well after a few days of walking all over my heels were very dry, then after a few more days they were cracking and bleeding, it was a tad painful, but we got to do so many fun things in Beijing. There was the Forbidden City, The Summer Palace, the Zoo, The Lama Temple, and Tiananmen Square. We got to go to a Kung Fu Show and an Acrobatics show. There was of course great food, and we even got to do a Hot Pot dinner where they bring you plates of raw meat and vegetables and you cook them in 2 different boiling sauces right there in the middle of the table. We got to walk the Olympic Line, and since I am an Olympics freak, seeing the Bird’s Nest and the Natatorium in person was one of my favorite parts of the trip. We did our share of bartering at the Silk and Pearl market, I have never seen so much merchandise packed in one building. But of course the best part was climbing the Great Wall. We got a private tour guide that took us to a part of the wall that is not open to the public. It was awesome to have the wall all to ourselves, and to get to hike around wherever we wanted. We had an awesome trip. I LOVE CHINA!!!
Some of the trip highlights:
· Feeding hobo Zhou (pronounced Jo) sesame covered bean paste balls on the subway
· Visiting our cute friends at the cookie stand
· Eating Lambus bread from the bread stand
· Petting zebras at the zoo
· Running down the Olympic line
· Cuddling with strange Asians on the train
· Having fall weather
· Getting away from the humidity of Zhongshan
· Ditching our tour guide to make an ice cream run
· Eating lots of delicious sweet and sour chicken/fish (the waitress didn’t know the word for chicken so she kept calling it fish)
· Having many Asians want their pictures taken with us
· Visiting 2 silk factories because, “you don’t like…you don’t drink tea?”
· Getting strange looks from Asians for eating Oreos with Peanut Butter
· Going into the secret room of the movie store
· Guessing at the pronunciation of Subway stations
· Trying chicken feet
· Feeding the monkeys at the zoo banana chips and hairy meat sticks
· THE GREAT WALL!!
· Having tons of fun with all the girls!!!

This is my tiny spot on the trainTerracotta Warriors

The Great Wall
Our Hot Pot Dinner

I love China Shopping!!!!!!!!!!

2009-09-30T19:23:00.001+01:00

Things here in China are relatively cheap once you find out where to shop. We have found cheap clothes and snacks and such, but our favorite things to shop for are movies. The movies here range from about $1 to $5 American dollars. Every time we go to the movie store we always come back with a few good finds, but today we had great luck. We had already purchased a few movies each, and then we noticed a little box by the counter that was full of CD sleeves with the DVDs in them. We started to browse and found a few good ones. The lady at the counter noticed us and she told us that each of those were 2 Kuai each (29 cents). Then she took us over to a corner at the end of the counter and she showed us 2 drawers full of these case-less DVDs. The next half hour or so was spent digging thru the rejected movies. Little did the movies store owner know what treasures they had. I ended up getting 16 movies for less than $5 American dollars. I love China shopping!!!

Vacation to Guongzhou

2009-09-30T19:01:00.006+01:00

We got to go on our first vacation last weekend, and it was tons of fun. We started off the day with a little visit to Shamian Island, where we ate American food at Lucy’s, it was heavenly. Next we were headed for the White Cloud Hills. We had to split up and take two taxis there. I was part of the first group with 2 other girls. We got dropped off and we waited at the entrance for the other group… and we waited, and waited. They never showed. The head teacher with the map, and all other useful information was with the other group. Since we were fine, and there was no possible way for us to look for them if we did leave, we decided that for the time being we would ignore the fact that we had no way to get back to our hostel and do some exploring. We had been dropped off at the entrance of a garden, and we had a great evening hiking around and taking fun pictures with the statues. When it started to get dark they turned on all these fun lights, it was beautiful. Getting back to our hostel didn’t turn out to be too hard, we did have a Chinese book, so we showed the taxi driver the word metro, and from there we backtracked to our hostel. We ended up getting there just 15 minutes after the other group, sadly though they did not have as much fun as we did. They had been dropped off at the other side of the mountain where all the hiking trails start, and after waiting for us for a while, they started a trail just before it was getting dark so they did not get to see much. We all had more fun the next day. We caught a bus to Foshan where we saw a Buddhist Temple, and a really cool European style alleyway that we had fun climbing around and exploring in. Next we were off to the pottery village where we saw tons of cool ceramic pots, statues, bowls, and whatever else you can imagine. We even got to tour a 500 yr old kiln, and try our hand at making our own pottery. The next day while making our way back to Shamian Island we got caught in a typhoon. We were soaked, but it was actually pretty fun splashing around in the huge puddles and the waterfalls going down the stairs. Here in China you are always wet, whether it is from sweat or rain, you can always count on being wet. Anyway we had tons of fun bartering in Shamian Island for great souvenirs. We found this store that was going out of business, so they would barter way low with us, it was great. It was a heavy walk back to the apartment from the bus station with our new treasures, but it was a way fun vacation.

2009-09-12T06:47:00.003+01:00

Yesterday was National Teachers Day here in China. The school was all decorated with balloons and ribbons, and there was a big assembly. We got to go on stage and get flower leis from the kids, and one girl even brought little paper cranes for all the teachers. It was so fun. Then last night we were invited to a dinner at a nice restaurant here in Xiaolan. We were was excited to go, a little nervous about the food and not really knowing Chinese etiquette, but mostly excited. Then they tell us that, “Oh by the way we would like the ILP teachers to perform an American dance at the dinner.” What?? So our free time this week has been spent learning “Thriller.” (There were hints that they wanted Michael Jackson). I was way nervous, especially considering the fact that I cannot dance and I didn’t already know parts of the dance like the other girls. I did manage to learn the dance though, so then I just had to be nervous about getting on stage and drawing a total blank on the moves. When we got there, we were quite surprised by the amount of people in attendance. There were over 250 people there made up of teachers from other schools and Government Officials, ya know nothing to really be nervous about. We were told that we were the 4th group to perform. Although we did not know beforehand that the other performances would be people talking or singing a nice calm song, then all the sudden we bust out “Thriller.” I wonder what these people think of us crazy Americans. It was really fun though, and we did great for the beginning and the end, with only a few minor mistakes in the middle. I wish I could post the movie for you to see, but alas, China has blocked all means to make that possible. I will show anyone who wants to see in December when I get home.
Now on to the dining for the evening. The food was sooooo good. They just brought dishes full of different foods out and put them on this plate thing in the middle of the table. Then you just roll the plate thing around and everyone takes what they want. We struggled a little bit with the chop sticks. We are fine eating with them, but it is hard to serve yourself with them. There were many dishes, and even though our coordinator Annie was there, we still did not always know what we were eating. Some of the ones we did know were: fish and water chestnuts, large shrimp, fried tofu and cabbage, cantaloupe with peppers and cashews, chicken, chicken and shrimp soup, some sort of bread cake, and watermelon (no rice in sight). Oddly enough our favorites were fried sweet and sour fish and pigeon. The Chinese like to do cheers a lot, and you don’t just cheer the people around your table, you get up and cheer everyone. It is pretty funny because everyone goes at different times, so you keep having to get up to cheer people while you are trying to eat. We had a great time trying the different foods, and it was a way fun night. We love National Teachers Day!!!

2009-09-09T11:04:00.004+01:00

This weekend we have done lots of really fun things. On Friday night 4 of us ventured out to try a Chinese restaurant. It was pretty interesting trying to order because our waiter didn’t speak English and we don’t speak Chinese. We just pointed to what we wanted on the menu, and then we even pointed at the table next to us to tell the waiter that we wanted what they were having. The food actually turned out to be really really good. We really lucked out considering we had no idea what we were eating, but we never really know what we were eating. The meat here has lots of bones though, so it is a little hard to eat, and I learned the hard way that is it not a good idea to pop a piece of ginger into your mouth (I thought it was a potato), it was so strong that it burned my whole mouth.
Saturday we went out for pizza at “Little Italy’s” for Skyla’s birthday. It was so great to have cheese again! Next we headed off for karaoke night with some of the teachers from the school. We had a great time. The other teachers even got Sklya a bouquet of roses, and there was a cake and everything.
Now for our next adventure, which I will start off by telling you that my hair has never been as clean as it is right now. Annie (our Asian coordinator) took us to get our hair cut, but it we got so much more than that. We started off with about an hour long head massage and hair washing. They even washed our ears, and massaged our necks. Next we went on to get our hair styled and cut. I must admit that I was way nervous because I have heard horror stories from the other ILP teachers about getting their hair cut here in China, but I was determined to be brave. We looked thru the pictures, and I was still way skeptical and just kept thinking “I so do not want a Chinese mullet.” My cut ended up being really good, and we all had a great time. Now for the best part… the whole thing cost less than $4!!! Definitely can't beat that in the states.

Happenings in a Far and Distant Land!!

2009-09-02T10:01:00.002+01:00

Greetings from China!!!

After lots of traveling on planes and thru Hong Kong I am now safely to mainland China. Hong Kong was tons of fun to see. We felt kindof spoiled that we got to start out our trip there (more people speak English in Hong Kong). We went to see this big Buddha and some monasteries and stuff. It was really cool, and we have fun pictures. The next day we did a tour. The tour took us past Jackie Chan's office and house, and up to Victoria's peak where we could see a lot of the city. We lucked out and it was a clear day, so the view was amazing. Later we went to a jewelry factory, and that was pretty fun. After that we got to go do baptisms at the Hong Kong temple. That was way fun. When we got there they were doing some baptisms in Chinese, and they speak soooo fast. They did ours in English, but again they go sooooo fast, almost so fast you still think they are speaking Chinese because you can hardly understand them. The poor little Asian man was probably very overwhelmed with all of these giant girls that he had to baptize. The font was really little, and it was not very full, so it really was quite an experience trying to get totally immersed in the water. I bashed my knee on the front of the font the first time I went down. Anyway it was a really cool experience, and I feel very privileged to have gotten to help these people with that important work. After baptisms we went to a laser show on the pier. It was pretty cool, but honestly I was expecting it to be a little bit better. They had these lasers on the top of the building and music playing, and it was all choreographed and stuff, but the lasers were so far apart sometimes that by the time you noticed where they were you saw them for about 2 seconds, and then they moved on to another spot. Anyway it was really fun to be out on the pier, and take in the fun atmosphere. We spent all day Sunday traveling from Hong Kong to Zhongshan. It is pretty funny to watch our group travel around. There are about 30 people and 70 huge pieces of luggage as well as many carry ons. We took a ferry over, and then I of course am one of the 2 from our group who almost got quarantined. They took me and this one other kid away to this little room (of course speaking to us in Chinese the whole time so we had no idea what was going on), they took our passports then gave us facemasks and shoved thermometers in our armpits and left us to sit there. I actually managed to stay rather calm, and told myself it wouldn't be that bad if we had to stay there, I was also really glad that there was another kid with me. Well the other kid's thermometer fell out so he had to start over, but after a long while they finally came back and gave me my passport and let me go on to join the rest of the group. We both made it out fine, then we loaded the vans and headed on to the new kindergarten for or first official dinner in mainland China, which ironically enough was broccoli, watermelon, and spaghetti. Then we went on to our part of the city to see our apartment. We lucked out and there are enough rooms for everyone to have their own, except for 2 girls. There are even 4 bathrooms and 2 kitchens. It is way humid here. We had to haul all of the luggage up to the 4th floor (no elevators), afterwards we were soaked, it is rather disgusting.

We got bikes and locks yesterday for 148 kuia, which is 21 dollars. Mine has a few problems (we already had to go back to the bike shop because the chain broke), but they are fun. The little man at the shop just laughs at us now as we take turns going back to get new problem fixed. China has a bit of a smell, and we are already joking about how excited our families will be to have us all come home smelling like China. There is also a taste to everything that is a hint of China, we will probably get used to it soon. Some things don't have much flavor, but we really haven't gotten to try much Chinese food yet. Annie (our cute little Asian coordinator) orders us food for dinner and lunch everyday, sad thing is it is all pretty much the same, and we are getting sick of it. It us usually just lots of steamed rice, and either potatoes or some other vegetable with a little bit of meat. Yesterday we got peppers, and it was a lot like my moms pepper steak, I really liked it, it reminded me of home. Today though we got tofu (one of the girls here is vegetarian). BLECK it was nasty. The texture was so gross. It was really hard to pick up with chop sticks (which I am getting good at), and it sort of melted in your mouth but was hard to swallow because of the nastyness. I am trying to be brave though and to try everything.

Today we started teaching!!! wow was that crazy. We were on a weird schedule, so we only ended up doing 3 rotations. tomorrow we should do 6. The classes are a little strange. I am teaching gym, and the first class didn't go very well. The second class was great (both of those classes were older 5-6 yr olds). My last class was younger kids (4-5) they were well behaved, but they would not repeat what I would say, in fact they mostly just stared at me like I was an idiot. Oh well, they will get better, and hopefully I will get lots better too. For gym we are supposed to have a huddle after we play a bit, the first time I said ok guys huddle up, one girl ran up and just gave me a big hug. lol I guess she thought I said cuddle or something. Anyway it is a very interesting experience. We all thought that we would be in tears by the end of the day, so we were doing leagues better than we thought. The kids are way fun too, and I figure even if I am terrible, they can't complain too much about a volunteer

Sthere are no pics. I am working on it, but with the China blocks, I was lucky to even get to blogger.

Summer Update

2009-08-18T16:41:00.004+01:00

This summer has been tons of fun, but it went by way too fast. I had to get 2 skin grafts done in my mouth 2 weeks ago, that was a fun bloody mess, but it is healing nicely now, and I am happy because I can eat pretty much whatever I want again. The sad thing is that I might have to get 2-3 more grafts done after Christmas, what fun!! I spent a weekend in Cedar City with Megan and Andrew in their new townhouse, and we had tons of fun. I already know from past experience that I am going to miss Megan most when I leave. My job out at the Potash plant was tons of fun. The people in the crew that I worked with were great, and I even got to work with my Dad some. I learned lots of cool things like how to drive a loader, and I had a good time. I am now done working at both the plant, and the store and I leave for China tomorrow!!! I should start packing huh?I have spent the last week or so hanging out with my friends as much as possible, I am going to miss them. It was a great summer.

Eddie's angels!!

Random, but this is my retard moment where I fell while running behind my house this morning.

cHiNa!!!!

2009-08-01T18:25:00.008+01:00

This week I went to Provo for my 2 day ILP (international language program) training. It got me really excited for many things I will encounter when I am there, kinda nervous for a few things, but mostly excited. The training was surprisingly not boring, considering that it was for 9 hours each day. I leave for Hong Kong on August 19th where I get to tour around for 2 days before going on to Zhongshan where I will be teaching. I am very excited for this new adventure of my life.

Summer Fun!!!

2009-07-04T23:32:00.005+01:00

So I have been a slacking blogger lately. I am now back in the states for a very busy summer. I work about 62 hours a week between my two jobs, but I still manage to find time to play with my family and friends, who needs sleep anyway?

Last weekend Megan and Andrew came to visit and they brought Parker and Payton along for a fun fun weekend. We started off Saturday with a slip n slide in the front yard. Even Mom joined in, and we had a few great laughs. Andrew is definitely the biggest daredevil of the bunch. Mom kept assuring us that her body just does not slide. She was so funny, she would take off running, then she would just sit down when she got to the tarp and use her hands to push her along.If you got going too fast down the hill you ended up in the flower bed with scratches and mud all over you, (though the picture of this occurrence is Megan, most of us experienced it first hand). Well as if we had not had enough water fun, we headed to Left Hand for the afternoon with some friends. The water was pretty high, so there was great jumping, we even got Parker to jump off the rocks as long as he was between Andrew and I. Stacy and Jer joined us as we were hiking back. We discovered that Andrew is not the best babysitter as he let Payton get carried away with some stranger. It turned out to be Jeremy, but I think Payton was sure scared for a second.
We finished off the night with a birthday party for Geneava and a movie. The next day we attended Brennan's homecoming. It is so fun to have my good friend back. He is such an entertaining person. I hope Andrew enjoyed his little glimpse of Moab. The whole weekend was full of family, fun, great food, and of course some heated rounds of Settlers.

Exciting Weekend!!!

2009-05-21T12:04:00.003+01:00

So after a rigorous week of studying and preparing a talk for church, I am happy to say that I am done with all of my finals. I have one more tiny presentation for my event class, but that should be no big deal. For any of you that were wondering, a 2 hour essay final where you have to write four 3-4 page essays on law cases is really not fun, in fact it is actually quite painful. We were pressed for time and it was really funny to see everyone in the row stop every now and then to shake out their hand before continuing on with the painful writing. But I am now done!!!! Tori and I are headed to Dublin today for a funfilled weekend. Then even more exciting is the big news that Mom will be here on Sunday!!!! We however have really bad timing, so Tori and I are scheduled to speak in church the very morning that she will be arriving so we will not be able to meet her in Shannon. (Sorry Mom) She will be on her own to get to Galway, and then to meet us at the church. I am soooo excited to see her, and to spend the next two weeks traveling around before we had back home to the states.

My best Friend!!

2009-05-16T11:48:00.006+01:00

I love all of my sisters, but there is a very strong bond between Megan and I. She is my best friend and I am so glad that I have her in my life. It is so fun to grow up with a twin, I always had a friend to do things with, someone to stay up late and talk to, someone to help me with my clothes and hair. And even though we are apart more now, the time that we get to spend together is still just as special. I remember many times when I had to say goodbye to Carson as I went off to school with Megan. I would try to control my tears so we could leave just to get in the car to find Megan there crying even harder because she was sad for me. She is the best friend anyone could ask for. I love you Megan.

My Tender Mercy for the Day!!!

2009-04-24T11:07:00.004+01:00

So I am sad to report that the charger cord to Tori's laptop has shorted out, so until further notice we do not have access to any of the pics or documents on it. Sorry to all of you who are waiting for pics of the fun spring break that we had traveling around Europe. Sad for me because my Event Management portfolio that I have been working on all sememster is now locked in the dead laptop. I now have the happy task of redoing it by Monday morning, just the way that I wanted to spend my weekend, NOT. Anyway needless to say I have been quite busy with school work and projects this last week, and I was starting to get quite stressed out. So that makes what happened today such a great boost for me. I was in my Irish studies class and we have just started the section on music. I was sitting there thinking how fun it would be for me to get a book of sheet music of traditional Irish tunes. Then of course reality hits that I have no money, and I would also have no idea what to look for. As class is ending though, our teacher says that he has actually had a book published of a compilement that he has made of some traditional Irish tunes, then he pulls three copies out of his bag and says he is going to give these copies to the first three people that were in class today. Luckily the Irish ways have not completely rubbed off on me and I am still running on my Utah time schedule, so of course I was one of the first three people in class. So I am now the proud owner of my own copy of Pale Rainbow: Gaelic Folksongs with English Translations by Brian O'Rourke. YAY for me. I am so excited to go play the tunes. I know it is really lame that this made me so happy, but seriously it could not have happened at a better time.
Aside from all approaching deadlines for school projects, life here in Ireland is great. I am having great fun. I really like my school and I love the people, they are soooo nice. The weather is even warming up, so maybe I can hit the beach soon. The Irish are a lot tougher than me, and they have already hit the beach. I however cannot get myself to get in the water with the others when you see people walking along the trails completely bundled up in pants and a big coat. I see something wrong with that picture.

The pics are from our little day trip to Connemara and Kylemore Abbey. Enjoy!

The "Quiet Man" cottage.

King and Fools Day!!!

2009-04-05T09:58:00.006+01:00

For my Event Management class we had to form a team and plan and organize an event. We became the A-Team, and our event was a King and Fools sports day. The goal of the event was to raise as much money as possible for the Alan Kerins Foundation. Alan Kerins is a hurling player here in Ireland, and he organized the African project where they go down to Africa and build schools and such that the people need. I volunteered to be the assistant chairperson because no one else wanted the job. Well I never thought that the chair would get sick and end up in the hospital the week of the event. I had to quickly step up to the challenge of assuming the head chair position, kind of scary, but all in all everything worked out great. We started off the event with HUG WEEK to get the word around. Alan came and we wore bright orange aprons around the college and gave hugs for 2 euro. At first it was a bit intimidating going around to people I didn't know and asking them to pay me 2 euro for a hug, but it turned out to be great fun. The actual event took place on March 31st, and it was a huge success. The weather was perfect, and we had a fair turnout. The main event of the day was a five a side soccer tournament that 13 teams participated in. Some of the other highlights include a tug of war with the lecturers vs the students, a penalty shoot out, novelty races, and a puc fada tournament. Papa Johns provided pizza and it was a great day. The biggest job of the day was the clean up (some of the team members took off right after the games ended). We had 6 goal posts that we had borrowed from a soccer club that had to be returned by 6:00. Boy was that a big job. We had to get two people to carry the goals about a fifteen minute walk down the street. I ended up making 3 trips, and boy did we get some funny stares from all the people in their cars that we passed. I guess it would look funny if you saw a goal post walking down the sidewalk toward you. The guys that I was carrying the goals with were sure impressed with how tough I am, and they even said they owed me a pint at the afterparty that night. My shoulders and legs were sure sore the next day though. Cleanup finally finished a little after six and I hurried back to my apt. to shower and eat before heading to the city center to decorate for the after party. At the after party we awarded the winners of the day with their prizes, and we also had a big raffle of all of the sponsorship items that we collected. After the raffle we presented our lecturer with flowers. We ended up making over 3000 euros, and it was a great day. I am sad that the event is over, I had so much fun getting to know all of the team members and it was a great experience. GO A-TEAM!!!

St. Paddy's Day!!!

2009-03-18T17:58:00.006Z

This is for you Stacy. St. Paddy's Day as the students call it here in Ireland was tons of fun. The parade was grand, but a bit long. They actually kept stopping it to make it last longer, and boy did it work as it was close to two hours long. The Irish do not wear green though, or do the pinching thing like we do in the states. Tori and I however, got shamrocks painted on our faces, and wore our green in true American fashion. There are people dressed up in crazy hats and beards so they were really fun to see. The parade went down Shop Street which is a little walking street near the city center, and it was packed. The man in the air had a trampoline, and he did flips and twists in the air, he was probably my favorite part of the parade. There were also a few branch members that were in the parade, so they were fun to see, and we even got to watch the parade with some of the missionaries here. The weather was perfect, it seriously was the nicest day since we got here. The sun was shining and it was warm, who could ask for better. After the parade we had a nice sunny walk home. Once home, I made a lovely shamrock cake for the Relief Society Birthday party that we went to. It was a potluck, and there was a ton of great food. There was traditional Irish shepherds pie, mmmm and some great breads and soups. There were also many great desserts. We had a great time eating and laughing with the sisters from the branch. It was a great day. I hope everyone else had a great St. Patrick's Day!!!

Castles, Castles Everywhere!!

2009-03-08T14:57:00.008Z

The view of Blarney from Blarney Castle.

Cork

The Gardens at Bir Castle

The Telescope at Birr Castle. It was the largest one in the world for 70 years, from 1840-1910.

Birr Castle

Blackrock Castle

Redwood Castle

Our Limerick Friend!! He was soooo cute!!!

King John's Castle in Limerick

Bunratty Castle

Kissing the Blarney Stone!!

In the Dungeon at Blarney Castle.

Last weekend Tori and I rented a car and headed out for an adventure. Tori did a great job driving, but I was terrified nonetheless. The roads are super narrow here. There is barely enough room for two small cars, and I cannot even describe the fear when a bus or large truck comes around the bend towards you. There are even some roads that you would never guess were two way. They are so narrow that one driver has to pull clear off to the side (which is not very far since most of the roads are lined with stone fences, they do not have shoulders at all) and stop while the other car goes past. The funny thing is that none of this effects the Irish at all, they just fly past you at terrifying speeds even though they are only inches from your car. Anyway we headed southward for our adventure towards Limerick for our first stop. Limerick has been one of my favorite places that we have seen so far, it was beautiful. It is called the city on the river, and it was so fun to walk down the little tourist path towards King John's castle next to the river. We only spent a few hours there, and then it was off to Cork. Cork was actually not very fun since we spent a lot of the time lost and driving down scary roads. We have noticed that the signs here are more like teasers. They point you where to go till you are close to your destination, then there are no signs to be found. It is rather frustrating because you are so close, but cannot actually find what you are looking for. We did happen across Black rock Castle though. Inside they had a virtual astronomy and evolution tour, and you even got to play a game at the end to save the world. I beat Tori by over 200 points :-)

After that we did manage to find a few fun things to see in Cork. We walked through a park, and stopped at the Cork City Gaol. It is an old prison, and there we got to do an audio tour. There were mocks of people and things that would have been in the jail centuries ago, and they told you all about them, it was very interesting. After that it was off to Blarney. The Blarney Castle was fun to tour, but of course the real highlight is kissing the Blarney Stone to recieve the gift of eloquence, which of course we did!! The view of Blarney from the top of the castle was breathtaking, and it was a fun place to stop. After that we started back towards Galway with a quick stop to take pictures at Bunratty Castle. There are castles all over here, as you drive around, you see signs every 10-15 minutes pointing you towards one.

The next day we decided to go to Birr Castle since it is pretty close to Galway, and we had to be back at 4:00 for a branch open house. Birr Castle is one of the prettiest that I have ever seen. Unfortunately it is privately owned so you can't tour the inside. There was museum though telling about telescopes, photography, and the turbine engine because major inventors from each field came from Birr Castle. Talk about a smart family. There was also a lake and gardens to walk through. They were pretty, but I bet they are really fun to see in the summer when everthing has bloomed. This time on our way home we stopped at Redwood Castle for pictures, and then it was off to the open house. The members here were so excited to have a new meeting house just for them. It is just a small excercise gym that was redone to become their church. There are not pianos, or a baptismal font, and there are just a few rooms, but they are thrilled nonetheless. It really made me realize how much I take that for granted in the states where you can find church buildings everywhere.

That night we went to see "Confessions of a Shopaholic" with some girls from our branch. It was silly but had its funny moments. If anyone gets any grief from their husbands about spending too much money, they should take them to see it. Then they would see that we could be so much worse.

It was a great weekend!!!

The Princess Bride!!

2009-03-05T20:33:00.002Z

Tori and I found this great "Princess Bride" quiz. Everyone should try it and let us know what your score is. We got 24. We are especially curious to see how Cassie and Megan do. Good Luck, and make sure you watch all the way to the end!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4mF5tZ3TOw

Picture Tag!!

2009-03-01T20:38:00.003Z

I got tagged!!!!!!!!!!!!

1. go to your my document/my pictures

2. go to your sixth file

3. go to your sixth picture

4. blog about it

5. tag six people(no cheating!!!)

Megan tagged me, but I do not have my laptop here, so I used the sixth picture in my email.

This is Carson being weird with his hat. It was taken the first summer we were dating. I called it Good Lookin!

I tag Kelsey, Alli, Kim, Cindy, Nicole, and Jessie.

The Cliffs of Moher!!!

2009-02-17T15:27:00.013Z

This weekend Tori and I got to go on a bus tour to the Cliffs of Moher!! It was amazing. The student union at the school arranged the trip, so we got to go at half price. The tour goes by the Poulnabrone Dolmen burial monument. Poulnabrone means "the hole of the sorrows." It was built around 2500 BC. Some other fun things we saw include: Dunguaire Castle, Corcomroe Abbey, and the Burren. The Cliffs were the highlight of the day. The weather was great, and the view was breathtaking. It was so cool to stand on the edge and look so far into the ocean. For those of you Priness Bride lovers, this is where the Cliffs of Insanity are located.

"Uh we don't go to pubs!"

This was the yummy pub that we had lunch at, but don't tell Kim :-)

This is our group.

Declan our tour guide/bus driver. He had a squeaky leprechaun voice. He was fun, and even did a little dancing for us.

Climbing up the Burren.

Corcomroe Abbey.

This is a fairy fort. Leprechauns are a type of fairy for those of you like me who didn't know. It is an old farming circle, and the Irish are very superstitious about them. If you go near one at night you will have very bad luck. There is a huge fine for damaging them, huge as in you could buy a house with the fine.

Poulnabrone Dolmen Burial Monument

Dunguaire Castle

This is me breaking the rules along with everyone else. It was pretty muddy once you got off the paved path, but so worth the view.

You could walk all along the cliff edges.

We had a great time!!!

HaPpY VaLEnTiNe'S dAy!!!!

2009-02-13T16:26:00.004Z

Handy Chat-up lines!!

If you were words on a page, you would be what they call FINE PRINT.
Do you believe in love at first sight, or should I walk by again?
You must be a heck of a thief becase you stole my heart from across the room.
Are you OK? Because heaven is a long fall from here.
Do you have a map? I just keep getting lost in your eyes.
If I could rearrange the alphabet, I would put U and I together.
If you were a tear in my eye, I would not cry for fear of losing you.
Wouldn't we look cute on a wedding cake together?
Was your father an alien? Because there is nothing else like you on earth.

Courtesy of Supermacs!!

Have a great Valentine's Day!!!

Stupid Fire Alarm!!!

2009-02-01T20:47:00.004Z

So I am not completely sure about the blogging rules, but it is more than 30 minutes since my last post. Kelsey will have to let me know if it is ok, but I forgot to tell about some things.

So I was walking home from school in the rain on Friday, when all of the sudden a car goes through a huge puddle and sends a tidal wave in my direction. You know in the movies when you see that happen, the person just standing there unsuspecting and they get hit with a wall of water, and they just stand there looking shocked for a second, and you think that it never really happens like that real life. Well let me tell you, it was EXACTLY like that. I was soaked, and it was a very wet walk home.

And now for our crazy saturday morning. So I got up to make bumpy pancakes. I am really weird, and I actually like to cook. So I go in and after using some interesting things for mixing bowls, and having to have Tori come in to actually figure out how to get the oven to preheat, I get everything ready and in the oven. So a few minutes later I check on the creation, which is doing nothing, but I can smell smoke. I send Tori in to find out what is wrong, and a few minutes later the fire alarms are going off. Me and my roommate run in to see what she is doing. The alarms soon shut off, but we don't know what to do about goopy eggy mixture in the oven. We leave it in for a few more minutes, but the oven is still smoking. I go in and turn the oven completely off, and hope the smoke will just settle slowly. No such luck. Soon the alarms are going off again, and this time it takes us much longer to air out the detector and get them to stop beeping. I am sure that everyone in the apartment complex wanted to wake up to the fire alarms on saturday morning. When we did get breakfast out of the oven, it looked a little funny. It didn't rise or get bumpy like it was supposed to, it just stayed flat, but they still tasted ok. Anyway I am sad that the oven is mean and does not like to be used. After all of this, my roommate informed us that she has never gotten the oven to work. Sure wish I had known that before.
Too bad I am reminded that I like to cook only when I am stuck in an unstocked kitchen, that is cold and lonely to cook in, where nothing works properly. Oh well. Maybe I will cook up a storm when I get back to Moab. That will probably make my mother happy.

What a coincidence!!!

2009-02-01T17:43:00.003Z

Wow!!! Tori and I had a great weekend. I started school this week, and it really is crazy. It is perfectly normal for the teachers to not show up at all the first week or two. I still have not had all of my classes. As crazy as the schedule already is, they change and move the classes a lot. I guess it will just keep life interesting.
But now the weekend is here and life is going great. Yesterday Tori and I headed out for some exploring. We actually found a small grocery store that is not too far from where we live. YAY!! Earlier in the week we carried a very heavy load of groceries across town because we had finally found a larger store. (next time we are not getting anything heavy like apples and oranges ;-) Anyway then we headed to the city center to wander through some of the shops. We also went to the Saturday Market, and that is lots of fun. They had all kinds of food stands, and craft stands selling funny hats and jewlery and stuff. We are going to go again some other weekend because we got there when they were starting to shut down. After our little outing we had a movie night with pizza. They have lots of great coupons here so we splurged on some pizza.

Today we got to go to church!!! YAY AGAIN! After two weeks of unsuccessfully finding where the branch meets for church we were finally able to get a hold of the Bishop in Limrick, and he gave us a new number to get a hold of our branch president. After calling him, we found out that church is held at the Days Inn Hotel, and we have been walking right past it every week. It was so great to get to go today. Our branch is very small, but very international. There are members from Nigeria, Brazil, the US... The opening prayer was said in Portuguese. Everyone was really nice. Now for the coincidence. So after Sunday School, we were going across the hall to the relief society room and one of the 4 missionaries stopped to talk to us. He is from Nephi Utah so he wanted to ask us about where we were from. We told him we were from Moab and he said, "Oh yeah I know someone from Moab, big guy... oh what was his name... oh yeah Zane Taylor." We smiled and said, "oh yeah we know Zane, he's my age, great guy..." So we kept talking and then the Elder says, "there was one other kid, do you know CARSON DALTON?" What!!!! Tori and I just looked at each other, then I managed to say,"Uh, yeah I know Carson." In my head I am thinking that I sound like an idiot, ...sure I know Carson a little, no wait I know him a lot, he is my best friend, we write each other every week... By now we are laughing, and the Elder made fun of me later because he said my face turned bright red when he asked. I was in such shock, what are the odds I would come to Ireland and meet someone who knows Carson. They met in wrestling, and he was also at SUU at the same time as Carson. We were still laughing when we went in for relief society where Tori made a love connection. There were some visitors from Oregon, a mother and her daughter, and Tori and I sat by them. The mom turned to Tori and asked if she had a boyfriend. When Tori told her, "No." She was instantly the perfect girl for this guy that she knows back home. After church she talked to us a bit more, and exchanged information with Tori so they can be facebook friends. She seemed pretty set that Tori was the perfect one for this guy, and her daughter vouched for the success of her matchmaking skills. They told us some more stories about him and he does sound great ;-) He is from Utah and he is currently in Provo. They were dissappointed that Tori will not be back to the states until June though. I wonder if she will try to set him up with anyone else between now and then. Tori is laughing though because she came all of the way to Ireland to get set up with a boy from Utah.
And now good news for Lindsay!!! We were in the hall after the meetings talking to the mother and her daughter, and getting made fun of by the missionaries when the branch president asked me if either of us play the piano. I told him that I can play a little bit, and he asked if I would accept a calling to play sometime. Now for the good news!!! The Branch President said that they have extra keyboards and he would bring one over for me to borrow while I am here so I can practice. YAY!! I was so excited, I didn't know what I was going to do without my piano for over 4 months, or how rusty I was going to be when I get home. I am not too excited to play in front of the ward, I get really nervous and sound like I have never played before. But if I get to borrow a keyboard, I will endure!! At church we also found out that there is institute on tuesdays, and we even got a ride arranged for it. There is also a single adult activity this weekend in Limrick, and though we have not gotten a ride to it yet, it sounds like lots of fun. It was a great day at church!!! We are so blessed to be members!!!

What We Learned in Paris...

2009-01-23T18:54:00.009Z

1. If at first you are intimidated by being dropped off by a bus in a foreign country that you don't know the language for, don't worry! After about 20 minutes of wandering around lost and feeling rather hopeless, you will soon figure out the metro system.

2. If you get off the metro or the elevator 1 stop too soon, it will be a bit of a wait till the next one comes along.

3. Pastries bought and carried around in a bag still taste good 3 hours later.

4. Pastries from France are good in general.

5. The Eiffel tower is beautiful in the day- breathtaking at night!

6. The elevator ride up the Eiffel Tower is really scary. (and I can ride any roller coaster with the best of them)
7. Going up 4 flights of spiral stairs to get to your hotel room will make you dizzy.

8. Beware the Africans!! They are ruthless, avoid at all costs!

9. The free walking tour is great, and very informative.

10. When already suffering from jet lag, moving farther east into a different time zone doesn't help.

11.The view of the city from the Sacre Coeur is well worth the many stairs you have to climb to get up to it (and the scary Africans encountered)
12. Don't walk the streets around the Moulin Rougue! Just take a picture and go back down the metro.

13. According to our tour guide: if you were to look at every piece of art in the Louvre for 30 seconds, it would take you 4 months to get through, that is with no breaks to eat or sleep and such. And that is just the pieces on display, there are also many many in the basement.

14. The metro is not for those who value their personal space.

15. Notre Dame is amazing.

16. The French hated the Eiffel Tower when it was first built, and it was only supposed to stand for 20 years. Now I bet they would never let anyone mess with their tower.

17. According to our tour guide the French consider you uncultured if you get excited about things and they are not necessarily rude, just stressed out. They never smile.

18. There is a lot of graffiti anywhere there is not a national monument or historic building. It is nice not to speak French so you don't know what all of the graffiti says.

19. It costs over 4000 euro to light up the Eiffel Tower each night.

20. Paris is beautiful!!!

About to go up the Eiffel Tower.

The view from the Eiffel Tower.

Notre Dame

The chocolate turtle on the shelf is over $350. I bet he is worth every dollar:-)On the right the wall is a chocolate fountain. Below is our favorite breakfast stop. I love this picture! That was in the Shannon airport before we left. We were two among a sea of soldiers.

We had a great time in Paris, besides all of the grafitti, it really is a beautiful city. It was so fun to hear all the history and there were tons of fun sites and museums to see. We wish you all could have come with us. We are now safely back in Galway, and I went to my five hour orientation today. AHHH it was so long and the whole time we could see the sun shining outside while we were stuck inside. The worst thing is we didn't even get registered yet, but I did meet some of the other students, so that was one good thing. I am excited to start school on Monday. The class schedules are strange here though, you will have a class on Monday at say 10:00, and then on Wednesday you will have the same class at 3:00. Hopefully I can keep it all straight, otherwise I will probably be missing classes here and there. Hopefully the weather is nice tomorrow because I want to do some hiking.

Where is Church???

2009-01-18T18:31:00.005Z

The weather for the last two days hasn't been great. I don't really mind the cold, or the rain, but put them together with wind, and it gets pretty miserable. The wind just howls outside our apartment, but we braved it yesterday to go to the library and to get some food. It is really hard to find things here, even with a map, (actually the map is pretty useless). Once we ran all of our errands, we caught a bus home, and were pretty much frozen by the time we got there. We did see some cool docks on the way though, and we found a pretty cheap store for clothes and stuff, now we just need to find one for food. Today the weather wasn't much better, but we again braved it, in dresses nonetheless, to find where church was . After waiting at three bus stops in the cold rain and wind, we actually managed to find where church was supposed to meet (it is in an old railway station). That in itself was a great accomplishment, I was so excited when I saw the exact name on the building that we had as the address to the building. Unfortunately there were fences and gates in front of the building. A man waiting in his car flagged us down (he thought we were sister missionaries). He was from San Diego and was looking for church also. He comes here a lot for work, and told us that the last two weeks, no one has met there. He said he had been trying to call the branch president all week but only got busy signals. We waited just a little bit longer to see if it was starting late or something, but no one ever came. So we went to again wait at the bus stop in the cold. (It is really confusing trying to figure out when the buses come, and which one you want to get on). Anyway we were again mistaken for sister missionaries by the garbage man (who did offer us a free ride). He kept saying he would give us each a thousand jewels if we would go to church on Saturday or something along those lines, he went into Abraham and the Jews and stuff. Tori was the main one talking to him, so I only heard bits and pieces, but I think that was the gist of it. We just smiled and laughed with him. Next week I think I will wear pants over my dress to church, that is if we can ever find where they meet.

This was on Thursday when the weather was nice

2009-01-16T19:58:00.000Z

Lynch's castle. It is now a bank.

We live somewhere over there. Past all the houses you can see.

The Spanish Arch.

St Nicholas Church.

This is My School!!!

Fun sites to See!!

2009-01-16T19:30:00.000Z

Today we got out and saw lots of fun things. We are figuring out our way around town, and we got bus passes and successfully got on the right bus to go home. (yesterday we had to walk a little ways from the bus stop because it turned unexpectedly). The roads and drivers here are crazy. For those of you Americans who think you could drive here because it would just be backwards, think again. The lights make no sense, or the drivers aren't following them. There are tons of round abouts and the roads are really narrow. We will be lucky to not get hit, or die in a bus crash. Jk(I hope). We went to the city museum, St Nicholas Church, and the Spanish Arch. There are also fun little shopping centers that we seem to get lost in a lot. They are fun to walk through because there are no cars. They have lots of way cute stores, we haven't really gone in many yet, but we will. We also went to a little tiny claddagh (pronounced cladah) museum. It told all about the villiage and how the ring originated. Alli would have loved it. They had claddagh rings and bracelets and earrings, whatever you can imagine. I found out that school doesn't start until the 26th, so we are trying to plan some trips for next week. We are doing lots better with the jet lag, and things are going great.

Tori & Lindsay have made it to Ireland

2009-01-14T21:52:00.000Z

after a shuttle, 4 planes, one bus, and one taxi we are finally here at our apartment in Galway . Our roommate is from spain . We were so exhausted on the bus ride here we could hardly keep our eyes open, but what we have see in beautiful, and yes it is raining. Send this one to everyone.
We love you.
Lindsay and Tori

This is the e-mail that they sent to Mom and she e-mailed to me.