So Cool!

I just wanted to share this with everyone. I love Christmas lights, but synchronize them to music and it's even better.

TGIF

I am soo glad this week is over with! I had tons of papers and projects due this week! Every day I was working on something new. I am not looking forward to ESL or Literacy next week, but I'm sure only having two things to do will be better than five or six things like what was due this week. Only a few more things left then finals!! Sad to say, my finals are less stressful than the two weeks leading up to it.

This weekend will be a nice break from everything. We have Drew's foreman party tonight. Tomorrow we are going to go see Four Christmases, and then Drew has his Hee Haw's party. I'm excited for Four Christmases, it looks funny. Sunday we are going to Pemberlyn's blessing, then hanging out afterwards. This weekend is going to be fun!

Change

as many of you may know i really enjoy my Dr. Pepper, especially in the morning. i got used to every morning going and getting a nice cold 44 once in the mornings, roughly about 1.05 to 1.16 depending what gas station i was craving when i woke. living in Salem and working some where between Drapper and Ogden i had a lot of choices. getting dressed in the morning usually didn't consist of grabbing exact change, so i had at least $1 in change after buying my drink and what ever change i had after lunch, cause lets face it it isn't too "Cool" to be diggin in your pocket for exact change, a little tid bit i picked up from Chunga. I would go home throw all the contents of my pockets onto the bedroom floor. get ready for what ever activities i had going on that evening. slowly the change would accumulate on the floor until it was bbq or party time at my moms house. Audrey Madison and Kelsey looked forward to these times cause it meant lots of soda, food, candy, and people. but it came at a price! they were put to work. "what?" you may ask. every thing mop the floor clean every where, including my room, which was the most fought after. Why? if any of you have ever taken these 3 girls out in public they are like human change finders. any where they go there eyes are constantly scanning the ground for coins. so they loved collecting all the loose change off the floor and sepperating the quarters. i would just put it on my head board of my bed and slowly over the next couple weeks the pile would slowly diminish. come to find out my mom was using it to get her soda in the mornings and Audrey found a vending machine at her school that sold penceils. but there was always just enough for when i ran out of cash to still get my soda on my way to work.
Kirstin on the other hand has a 5 gallon water jug just for coinage. and her rule is once it is in it doesn't come out. this is a very difficult rule for me to follow cause now being married and all there is a lot less soda money that i am alloted each week so with the change building up so fast kirstins jug has filled up a lot faster but i get less soda. to combat this i stopped just throwing it on the floor where she will collect it and hiding it is various spots, she still finds it and throws it in the jug. needless to say i have been caught on a few occasions trying to shake the quarters out. she catches me most of the time so i have had to start getting refils as much as possible that way instead of having 95 to 75 cents change per drink i only have 15 to 25 and thanks to Walkers rewards card i get the occasional free drink.
how ever this too is a challenge for me cause i don't have a mug, and for some odd reason i feel awkward going in to Walkers to refil my Holliday cup, like they know i am not being loyal to them. kirstin just tells me too bad man up and get the refils cause there will be NO MORE removing change from the jug. so when this jug fills up what ever we end up doing with itsure as heck be AWESOME!!!!

Happy Anniversary!

It's been one crazy, yet incredible year! I just wanted to tell Drew how much I love him and how much he means to me. This is my ode to Drew:

When you love someone you're carefree and true,
No matter what they do to you.
You forgive and forget then move right along,
Every word they say seems like a song.

I love all the times he's made me laugh,
Like at the zoo, making fun of the giraffe.
Hanging out and goofin' around
At the bounce place rollin' around

Down in Levan, both cold and warm,
Riding 4-wheelers trying to stay out of harm.
Camping, hiking, and playing in the snow,
Off to the hot pots, here we go.

Going to Disneyland and riding every attraction.
The times I get upset with him is a small fraction.
At the beach, making a splash,
Our time in a Hawaii went by in a flash.

I love his touch and his arms around me tight,
When he kisses me I feel pure delight.
I know that his love is pure and true,
And he should know . . . I LOVE MY DREW!!!

I only do this corny creative crap for the people I really love, and now it's been done twice for you. You should feel special!
HAPPY ANNIVERSARY! I LOVE YOU!

Out of the Ordinary

I usually don't like to sit and write every little thought or thing that comes up, but being stuck in Woodland Hills taking care of my mom all by myself makes me bored. When I'm bored I do things out of the ordinary.

Field:
This semester's field has been going great! I have an awesome teacher who's in an awesome team. I know I am going to have tons of support from them during student teaching. My teacher is ofter disorganized and I love it! It lets me see that not being on top of things is common and it's OK! I have been able to get both of my PE lessons taught in the last couple of days because of this uncertainty on "what's happening for PE today?" This question is asked every Monday since the first day of school, and they always figure out what to do during lunch. Since it was raining today they decided to stay inside the gym, but didn't want the kids playing dodge ball (last week's game was out of control!). They suggested dancing, like the electric slide, but none of them knew it well enough, or had music for it. I then realized I had my Cha-Cha Slide CD in the car still from class and they asked me to teach it today. Good thing I had practice (and I must say it went much better without all the interruptions from you-know-who).
I've been teaching literacy (comprehension strategies) everyday since the first day I arrived. So. those are done too! The only thing I fear is the Math lessons. And, I still don't know which 3 kids I'm using for Management. Other that those 2 things it's been going awesome. Plus I get to talk with Angie and Kerri everyday during lunch. How's everyone else's going?

Home:
I haven't slept in my bed for the last 3 days and it sucks! My mom just had surgery and my dad had to go out of town, so you guessed it, I had to come play nurse and mom this weekend. I'm glad Drew came up at least one of the nights and stayed with me (thanks love). It's so boring here, but at least I have internet. Which brings me to my last little bit, we lost our cable and internet this weekend. Drew was at home Friday night and turned on the computer only to find we didn't have service. Then he tried the TV and nothing was on. The people upstairs said they were getting rid of the cable, but we still had regular channels and internet for a couple of weeks after that, now there's nothing. So, sorry if I don't respond to emails quickly, I've lost that ability.

The other day Drew and I got pumpkins from Hee Haws and carved them. I found this cool book that had patterns to make an image shine through to the wall. I decided to make the castle with the clouds. I love it, even thoug it looks so much better in real life.

Celebration

so with Kirstin away for the week end i was a little excited to go hang out with all my buddies like Danny and Eli but after work and between jobs it is hard to find the motivation to go out when i have a nice soft couch calling my name. i think kirstin knew this so to make it a harder decision for me she went shopping the day before she left and got a bunch of snack foods. she thinks i am getting to fat so it is stuff like carrots, except she did leave some chocolate, by some i mean she bought it for herself and i caught her so she left a couple pieces.
needless to say this weekend is not what i was expecting but at least i can leave the toilet seat up!

There, Their, and They're Frustrations

I've been noticing loads of people who don't know the correct homonym to use. For example, the most commonly seen mess up are:

There - Their - They're
Its - It's
Whose - Who's
Your - You're
Poor - Pore - Pour
Ware- Where - Wear
and yes even the
To - Too - Two

When I first moved here, I was forced into taking an English class because UVSC claimed that the 4 English classes I took at CSUF wouldn't transfer over. The first day the professor made us sign up to give a presentation on some of the homonym mix-ups he would see in the college student's papers over the years. I couldn't believe it, these were lessons and words I had mastered by middle school. He had said that 80% of the students in his classes would still use the incorrect homonyms in their essays. CRAZY! I can see why. I spent a month in 2 different classrooms and the only lesson on homonyms were just quick worksheets. BUSY WORK! It's madness! I understand why they don't drill the correct usage while they are in the lower grades, teachers are just glad the students are writing. However, you would think the high school teachers would notice a problem and give a lesson on the proper way to use these words. This way, we as college students don't lose valuable learning time more important things, rather than stuff they teach in 3rd grade.

I've just been noticing that adults who write emails or blogs mess up on these all the time. Seriously people, learn the right spelling of the words you are using, so it doesn't confuse the recipient. I don't count texting, since everyone is just trying to get as much info quick and short.

giving blood

i don't know why but when ever i give blood they have the weirdest people that work the little booth where they ask the questions. i like to give but sometimes half way through the interview i want to just leave. luckily the people that stick you are always very nice and up beat, making the the blood loss much more enjoyable

Breakfast

strawberry chex is wonderful. i don't eat breakfast but it makes a delightful snack

Summer After Hawaii

I know it seems like we haven't done anything this summer, but here is a few things to show everyone we're not so boring, we did play a lot after Hawaii, just didn't have the time to post anything. 

We went to Provo Lake with Alex, his roommates, and their dogs. They built some floating contraption and wanted to test it out. Who says you can't walk on water?

We went to Salem Days to watch the fireworks. My sister and her friends showed up as well. It took forever for them to start the fireworks, cause the wind was blowing so hard earlier, that their show was slow to start and went later than expected. Right as the fireworks started, it started to pour on us. We were soaked! It was such a fun time though. 


We went to Cancer Aid this year. It was interestingly boring. Drew didn't believe me that he wouldn't like it, but he still dragged me there. He was really glad to see Jacob, as was Jacob. He'd been gone all summer and finally came home today. We had both missed him. Drew really only went to Cancer Aid to watch Joffrey play. He is awesome on his guitar. 

TGIF

It's been awhile since I've been on here, so I decided to write why I'm glad this Friday.

1. Hardly anyone called in today at work.
2. I got to leave around 12:30 for a meeting at school and they told me I didn't need to go back into work afterwards! So Yea! Off early!
3. My meeting which was suppose to be 2 hours long only ended up being 45 minutes.
4. The Maverik Gas Station by my house is about 10 cents cheaper than all the other gas stations, and it went down 10 cents from yesterday. (I almost got gas yesterday, but glad I waited the extra day)
5. Drew lost ten pounds in the last two weeks by drinking lots of dr. pepper and not eating out at lunch
   

It may not seem like much, but I'm on a pretty good mood.

Hawaiian Fun!

So this took a lot longer than planned, but we've been so busy between work, birthday parties, moving people, and rebuilding my parent's deck I just never found the time. But it's here now.

This is the house we stayed in, it went in a "V" shape. The main 
part you can see is the living room area. The the little bit of the house you can see on the right is our room. This was the view from the balcony outside of our room. We did have the best room in the house. There was a pool in the middle of the "V"

We had a lot of fun there.

MONDAY: I was hoping they would find my luggage, so we stayed near Honolulu/Waikiki. We went to the aquarium, which was fascinating. They give you these phone looking things, and you punch in the number that's on the display and it tells you all sorts of things about what you are looking at. We were there during

the feeding and training of the Hawaiian Monk Seals, so we got to watch that. Those animals were so cute. These are just a few of the weird things we saw there. The jelly fish look cool in the tank they had, I wish the picture did a better job of showing that. There were some sort of sea dragon we were entrigued by. And Drew really enjoyed watching that shell thingy. The Aquarium was fun, but I still had no luggage!

TUESDAY: We went snorkeling where they do the Dolphin Adventures, I think it's either in Ko'Olina or Nanakui. We saw the boats of snorkelers swimming around, all of a sudden a bunch of dolphins came swimming up. We hurried and put on our gear and went out. I loved it! We tried to go there again Saturday, but The under current was really strong, and a bunch of scuba divers said t was really rough and wouldn't recommend going out there. The pictures we took while snorkeling still need to be developed. 

WEDNESDAY: We went to the swap meet that morning, and got all kinds of treasures. We then went to La'ie and Drew showed me the house they stayed in last year. We just stayed around the beaches of North Shore till we met up with Evan, Drew's friend from his mission. 

Later that night we went to my Auntie Reina's House for dinner. My Uncle Barry Barbequed. My cousins A.J. and Rusty didn't really come around, but the littlest cousin Bryanne made herself known. She was so cute.

THURSDAY: We drove around the coastline, stopping at almost all the beaches. We didn't go into the water at my favorite beach, but I loved it. It was around noon, and we were the only ones there. The sand was softer than the other places. Yes, there is a difference between the sands at the

different beaches. Some beaches have nice soft fine grained sand and others have rough kinda shelly sand. And you may have only been one

 beach over. It was the strangest

 thing. At the next beach, Kahana Bay, Drew decided to snorkel. Some while he was standing in the water, some guy started yeling at him from the parking lot. He was trying to get Drew's attention because right next to him was a sea turtle, he could have bent over and touched it. From Drew's angle, it looked like a rock though. Every time Drew turned to look at it, it would put it's head back into the water. It was totally teasing him the rest of the time on that beach. It would follow Drew around and always be

right behind him. It took Drew forever to finally figure out where the turtle was. It was entertaining. We stopped at several random places, like this lookout point in Waimanalu. It was so beautiful. I really enjoyed driving around the island. It was peaceful, minus my sunburn.

FRIDAY: I didn't really want to be in the sun because of the sun burn, so we went to see Get Smart at the Kapolei theater. We Just hung out and started packing and cleaning. We had to be out of the house that day. There was all this left over food, so we called the missionaries and gave it all to them. They seemed pretty grateful. That night we drove my cousin and his buddies to the bars. They were entertaining! It was cool meeting all of his

 friends, because he'll go out to sea, and when he ports, he will post a bunch of pictures of him and his shipmates, and now I can put names with the faces. So these are My cousin Garrett, his wife 

Jessica, and his buddies Bobby and Jason. Yes, they are all wearing the same outfits, this is what happens when you drink on your lunch break, you go into Hot Topic, and buy matching clothes. 

SATURDAY: We tried snorkeling again, with no luck. We then went to my cousin's house to drop off our bags, we were staying over that night. We ate lunch, then went on a tour of his ship. I wish I could have taken pictures, but they've become super strict about that kind of stuff. I couldn't imagine living on this ship for several months. It's crazy how many people actually are on that ship when it deploys. We even got to see the control room, even though it is suppose to be restricted. There were a ton of other ships from other countries there. Apparently they do these war games, some events like the olympics, but also a big game with "bad guys" and "good guys" every year the countries take turns on who is bad and good. So we got to see ships from Chili, Canada, Japan, China, and a few others. Again I couldn't take pictures, but wish I could have, because one of the ships was so different than all the others. The craziest thing about the base is their grocery store, which isn't even on base. We drove around base, walked around his ship, and they never once asked for ID from Drew and I, only from Garrett. Then we go to the grocery store, and they ask for ID, and give us this paper that states all these rules like;

1. Must stay in the presence of your guests.

2. Can not help shop.

3. Can not touch the shopping cart.

4. Can not touch any of the items in the store.

ect. We just laughed that the grocery store has much more rules than the actual base. I kept the paper of rules, just in case nobody believed me. 

That night we played games on my cousin's play station, and had a BBQ. One of my cousin's nieghbors used to be stationed in San Diego, and his old ship was in port, so he brought some of his buddies to my cousin's house. One of the guys from San Diego kept asking Drew all these questions about our religion, and didn't see how any religious person could be in the armed forces, because religious people are suppose to be a peaceful bunch, with no fighting and killing. Then he went on to say he believed in Buddhism which is one of the major religions against war. He was crazy!

SUNDAY: We woke up, had some breakfast, then got ready to leave. We were trying to meet up with my Auntie and her family one more time, but didn't have any luck. My Auntie had to drive her dad to a funeral. We went back to the swap meet with my cousins and their friend Bobby. Then we went and ate lunch with them. We got the few last gifts, like my Dad's father's Day gift, then went back to my cousin's house till we left for our flight. Drew and I had seats away from each other, but they managed to switch it around so we could sit by each other. What a long flight home! 

They Must Be Bored

This is what happens when they go to Hawaii. Thanks Corrine for sending Ryan that care package, now Drew wants to know where his Father's Day care package was.

Shocking Surprise

Everyone knows about me sewing through my finger. Well a couple of days ago my finger was killing me! Drew thought it might be infected, cause I couldn't bend it or touch it. Well The swelling went down a little, and I could use it again, so I didn't think too much of it. Today I decided to clean it out just to make sure it wasn't infected. There was what I thought was a scab, so I tried to scrape it off, thinking the infected part was under it. To my surprise, it was kinda shiny, and hard. I was in such pain as I touched it. I finally grabbed it with tweezers and pulled out the tip of the needle. That's right, the needle has been in my finger this whole time. 

Hawaii

It's official, I bought my ticket a couple of days ago. I'm going to HAWAII! It should be great, we have the whole house to ourselves, practically. Todd and Spencer are going to be on another island, I and think one of the guys and his wife will be there, but that's it. Beach here I come!

Flash Back Tag!

That's right, both of us are going to do this one. 

I'm in blue and Drew is in brown.

1. If you could tell your teenage self something, what would it be?

Beware of those cheer girls, they will turn on you!

Don't be a puss and kiss some girls

2. Did you do any extracurricular activities in high school?

What didn't I do? I had seminary at 5:30 in the morning, then early morning practice right after that. I played water polo, did stats for the boys water polo team, on swim team, on ASB, and was a cheerleader, so I went to lots of games. I lived at the school. I was at the school early and didn't go home till after the games ended, which was between 5 & 7 most nights. 

Heck No! I was way too cool.

3. What did you do in you free time?

What free time? Mostly cleaned up toilet paper from my front yard, toilet papered those who had done it to my house, and hung out at my house (my friends enjoyed all the arcade games, swimming pool, pool table, trampoline, and free food. I also went to Disneyland a lot to dance at the TLT, and parties at Adam's.

Blew stuff up and asked cheerleaders out for my brother.

4. What's the coolest thing you did in high school?

Lots of things my Freshman year, that was my favorite year. One night we went out trying to find a red bra for Kristin for the dance. Miu decided to try and pick up a cone while we were driving. He pulled it in. Soon all the guys were trying to pull these cones into the van. Then Jared and Todd decided came up with the idea of grabbing the road signs with the blinking lights on them. They also grabbed some sand bags holding down the other signs. Pretty soon the car was filled with all these construction signs and cones. Usually these guys would put them on my house, but I was with them, so they couldn't do that. They decided to put them on Samantha's house instead (She freaks out at that kind of stuff). We put the sand bags in front of her screen door, so she couldn't open it, the blinking lights by the kitchen window, and the cones all over her yard. Every time we passed a construction area, we would grab a cone, then drop it off at Sam's house. Ryan saw a 12 foot flag in front of an apartment complex. The 5 boys got out and grabbed it. They tried shoving it in the van, but it hung out the back about 3 feet. Todd sat in the back holding down the back door as we sped to Sam's house. They stuck that pole right in the middle of her front yard. It looked so funny.

The best thing about it was we had a water polo tournament the next morning. Our girls team had to be there at 5 in the morning to set up. It was still dark at that time. When Sam got there late, the coached asked what happened and she flipped out. The boys team was just getting there, she turned and yelled at them about the construction site on her front lawn. None of them had any idea what she was talking about. She still to this day doesn't even suspect us. 

I made my teacher cry on several occasions, and I built a house.

5. Did you have a boyfriend/girlfriend in high school?

A few, I almost always had a boyfriend.

I came close a couple of times, but I would always wuss out in the end.

6. What songs come to mind from then?

Vitamin C: Graduation, Green Day, Pennywise: Bro Hymn, Red Hot Chili Peppers: Love Rolleroaster, Beastie Boys, Offspring, 93.1 Arrow, Spice Girls, Sexy at 17, NSYNC, and Youngstown.

Eminen and Dr. Dre, especially Chronic 2001

7. If you could change one thing, what would it be?

I'm not sure.

Been more of a slut. 

8. What did you think you would be when you grew up?

A marine biologist, the person who jumps off of Shamu's nose. Oh and I guess I always wanted to be a teaacher.

A firetruck.

9. Add a high school picture of yourself.

We couldn't find one of drew, he never wanted to be photographed

10. What's the craziest thing you did in high school?

Every year we would have a cheer kidnapping, and those got a little crazy. We kidnapped the girls, decked them out in the dorkiest outfits, and were out all night reeking havoc throughout town. Then the next day they had to wear those outfits at school. Those were some crazy nights, but fun.

Got stoned and rode a 4-wheeler with a blanket around my neck as my cape. The blanket got caught in the wheel and it pulled me off the 4-wheeler and it almost ran me over. The blanket was shredded and it was Mandie's blanket her great grandmother made for her.

We tag The Hoyts (all of you guys)!

Weekend Fun!

Saturday we got up early and picked up the 4-wheeler from Grandma's house. We drove up Diamond Fork Canyon till we got to the end. We unloaded the 4-wheeler, put our lunch in the seat, and took off. We tried to go on several different trails, but they were blocked off. One of them had a way around the fencing, so we took it. There were all kinds of bones where the trail ended. We parked there, then hiked up to the top of the hill and ate lunch. On the way back, we decided to hike up to the hot pots, which was what we wanted to do earlier, but there was no parking anywhere. It was a fun "kinda" easy hike (I'm out of shape, plus this higher altitude kills me). There were a few families at the lower ones, so we hiked to the ones near the waterfall. It's so pretty there, but the water in the higher pots is so dirty! I felt gross most of the hike back, because of the smell. We asked this guy to take our picture with the waterfall in the background, obviously he didn't do so well at getting the waterfall in the picture.

On Sunday we went to listen to my sister's talk, then had dinner at my parent's house. We took the 4-wheelers up the hill to where the avalanche was a few years ago and drove them up the ditch the avalanche had made. it was a fun ride. We parked them and hiked up the mountain to the cave the bears lived in (Last year, a bear was found in several people's yards. The city captured the mama and baby bear when it wouldn't go back up the hill and was scaring most of the residents). There wasn't a trail, so we just hiked up the mountain, pushing through the trees. We were all scraped up by the end of the hike. We had to up this rock slide (again from the avalanche). That was funny. We took one step up and went down 2 steps. It was a steep hike, we had to use our hands to get up some parts of the mountain. 

The lower cave, where the bears must have lived was scary. There was a small opening and it had bones all around it, and many, many more inside of it. I wasn't even going to think about going inside that cave. The upper cave was more of a cove. It was about as big as our living room. It was really cool. After resting in the upper cave, we hiked up on top of the caves. That was a scary hike, I felt like if a made one false move, or stepped on one loose rock, I'd fall down the cliff. We were just on this bolder sticking our of the mountain. It was such a pretty view, you could see the whole town and all of the valley. If you looked up the hill, as my sister is doing in that picture, you can see another cave, and all of the damage the avalanche made. It's crazy how much destruction they can cause. 

BOB

get excited

we are getting so excite for this summer. so many fun things going on. hawaii is going to be a hoot. i think kistin is stoked to get rid of me now that it is warm and i want to be out running around all day. except at work i just rest up in the fork lift for the nights events.

iron man is awesome i am going to use that movie as my theme for this summer. cause he was very helpful.

we are also looking forward to the great quading we are going to do this year. there are still TONS of sweet trails to go get lost on

Pretty Bad Day

So yesterday at work I was sewing on these caps. These are the worst caps to sew on, they don't stay hooped. Well I was holding one cap in place and the other cap that was sewing looked like it was moving, so I glanced over at it. At that moment, the machine jumped and it sewed in a spot it wasn't suppose to, it sewed right where my finger was. It looks as if it went all the way through the finger, because there is a small hole on the other side. The whole tip is bruised and it kills me to move it. I have always told my boss that our machine doesn't like to sew hats. He tried to make this new contraption on the hoops to sew them better, so the machine won't jump. Obviously my finger can tell you  that it didn't work! Hopefully he'll stop ordering in crappy hats, or he'll stop making me sew these hat orders.

Goblin Valley 2008

We found an entrance to an old mine. We figured if Drew could fit, then we all could follow. 

It was a fun trip! Drew wanted to ride on the Devil's Race Track, which would have been fun if it hadn't been such a hard trail. I was so scared!

Moab 2008

Rascal loves to go 4-wheeling. He won't ever get off of the 4-wheeler.

There are other pictures you can check out from our trip.

Moving

I've decided I hate moving!!! It's much harder when I have to move in all the heavy furniture with Drew since nobody is around now to help. I'm glad we have stability there for at least a year. Unpacking sucks as well. I was starving yesterday, and I couldn't find a can opener to save my life. I thought that would be easier than trying to find our food and pans to cook in, but it took forever to find a stupid can opener. 

There's still more to unpack, but at least all of the big stuff is in, so we can put away most of our stuff in boxes. 

I'm in no hurry to move again.

Hello

So I decided, much against Drew, that I would make a blog for us. He wasn't so keen on the idea, but I enjoyed looking at everyone else's blogs, and getting to read what you all are up to. Even though we don't have all the kid stories like everyone else, I'm sure there will be some stuff we can post.
Enjoy

Drew's Fire Walk

Always a character during his fires!

Yes, he is trying to surf the fire. He had jumped in the river, so his pants were steaming everytime he got into the fire. The people at the fire next top ours was entertained by his stunts, although they really thought he was on fire and that's why the smoke was coming off of his pants. It was a pretty fun night.

One of Drew's fires. We didn't go to where we usually do, thus the fire was not as big as he would have liked it to be.