Thanksgiving

So I wrote out all the things we did for Thanksgiving but then I lost the whole thing when I closed my computer, so this will be the shortened version. We went to California and saw all of Travis' family, it was really nice to see everyone since we haven't been down for a year now...last Thanksgiving to be exact! We got to hang out with Devon and Shira, so nice to see friends. And Shira is all cute and pregnant too! We went out to eat, had a great Thanksgiving dinner at Travis' dad's house. And I read a lot and took lots of naps and was just plain lazy. But that's what the holidays are for right? We also got to look for apartments...since Travis just got a job and this is my way of somewhat officially telling everyone!...I think Travis wants to wait a little longer, like until we are all moved and what-not before really saying it's official. But we've found an apartment that we are really excited about and I'll keep the location a secret until Travis starts his first day of work! We unfortunately didn't partake in Black Friday, although we wish we had gotten a few things that were on sale...oh well, there's always next year. Now I'm back to work and Travis is studying up for finals next week and I'll I can think about is how much junk we have to pack :( There are no pictures, not that anyone would care to see anyway, but since we lost all our photos during a freak external hard drive sync, seeing the camera makes me angry! Maybe if we can get anything recovered I'll feel better, but until then it's all words and no pics.

Utah Drivers

So I've always felt that Utah drivers were the worst that I have ever encountered, including living in Texas. Travis disagrees and says that California is just as bad or worse because of all the traffic, but I have proved him wrong... On my way to work I make a right turn to get on the ramp for the highway. This turn is at a light and it's usually red when I pull up to it. So the other day I pull up and look left to see if I can go ahead and turn right even though the light is red (which is perfectly legal) and I notice a car in the lane next to me in the through lane. The light is still red and all of a sudden the car goes straight through the light and just keeps on going! It took me a few seconds to realize what was going on, I looked up and the light was just changing to green after the car was gone. So I realized that the car was waiting for the opposite light to change to yellow and then going ahead through the red to get a second ahead! I couldn't believe it...until a few days later I realize that the same car is sitting next to me at the same red light and it starts to go again (light still red) unfortunately this time a car was racing to catch the yellow light and was almost t-boned! Everyone was slamming on breaks and I think my eyes almost popped out of my head, I couldn't believe it! This guy almost got into a serious car wreck, which would have totally been his fault all to save literally 2 seconds of time! I'm sorry if I sound a little crazy, but I really don't want anyone doing that to me if I'm rushing to catch a yellow (not that it's all that legal either but still not that bad). Yesterday Travis and I saw someone do it at the light on our street, I can't believe this is a normal thing, but it sure seems like it. So I claim Utahans as the worst drivers ever!

Busy Sunday

Today we had such a busy day. Travis had bishopric meetings at 7, then came to pick me up for church at 9. Travis has to stay after church for a while to do callings and tithing. I went home to wait for visiting teachers, then Travis came home and we had a quick lunch before he left to do his home teaching. Then as soon as he got home, I ran out to do my visiting teaching. Then our home teachers came over (I didn't actually get to see them, since they came by before I got home from visiting teaching). So at 4 when we were all finished we layed down for a nap. When we woke up 3 hours later I thought I was going blind because the window was open and it was glowing orange. I've never seen anything so bright, I woke Travis up and he was so interested we both got up to go see what it looked like outside and this is what we saw.


Sorry the picture is so small. I put 3 pictures together to make this one. It was probably even brighter then this because minutes later it was black outside so it changes pretty fast.

Cedar Breaks

So on Friday Travis wanted to take me up to Cedar Breaks since you don't have to pay to go to the lookout this time of year (the real lookout, we've been to the free side one, but Travis said this one is better). Halfway up we knew we wouldn't be able to see anything, it was so foggy. But it was still a really pretty drive. We decided to go all the way up to Cedar Breaks anyway. We got to drive through the snow and everything was so frosted over it was awesome! Travis thought I looked funny freezing. As you can see behind me you can tell how foggy it was. That white is all we could see.


Then we say the trees which were frozen sideways, weird.



This was the drive down. My favorite were the red trees when we could find them.


And this was my favorite photo of all.


Hope you're having a great fall too! We're suppose to have snow this week so fall is almost over for us. I don't like winter!

Travis' new calling!

Well it's official now, Travis is now the 2nd counselor in the Bishopric in our ward! Crazy, I know. The worst part of it was that they called us in and gave Travis the calling three weeks ago. We had General Conference that weekend then Stake Conference the week after. My mom and sisters came down and Travis' dad and one brother came up from California. His dad also bought him a really nice new black suit! So great since he just has one grey one, now he'll have two! He'll be in them a lot so at least he can alternate, not that he's like me with a different dress every week. Hopefully I won't be alone all the time now, it's a good thing he doesn't have a job yet or I'd probably never see him.

Here's Travis with the weird missionary tag the bishopric has to wear. We think it's because it's a student ward they want to make sure that when new married couples come in they will know who is in the bishopric. I think he looks like a missionary again! cute!

Fun Friday

It was nice to have a good day after a terrible week. They've been laying people off at the school I work at, one of which was the mother of the girl I work with. So there was a possibility that she might take her daughter out of school and put her in a school closer to home, which means I could be out of a job too. But her mom said that she was going to keep her in school, so I survived. But I'm a stressed out person anyway, so it was a bad week. So on Friday after school we went on a drive through the mountains to see the colors changing and check out the snow. We drove up to Brian Head and Cedar Breaks lookout. It was so pretty! and there was sooo much snow already up there. We even saw a doe and 2 baby deer walking across the street, but they ran off when we got close, obviously. We also tried to find Aspen Lake, you can see it from a lookout point off the highway but we've never been able to get there after repeated tries. So we tried again and failed again after driving down a pretty much one-way dirt road for 20 min and then turning around. But it was still a really pretty drive, and we went to Costa Vida for dinner afterwards. We haven't been in sooo long and we realized why when we paid but it was so delicious! It was so relaxing after a long depressing week. The nice thing is that I have the week off work this week, time to relax a little more.


The little yellow tree on the bottom right in the picture above looked liked it was glowing! I couldn't get a good close-up, but it was crazy looking!


Some foreign guy took our picture at Cedar Breaks, I felt dumb giving him our little digital camera, when he had his full-on huge camera and equipment. But I don't think he spoke very much English anyway!


I tried to take some pictures while in the car, I wasn't fast enough, but this one looked cool.

5 Buck Pizza

Tonight we went to 5 Buck pizza again, I really like it. This is not to be confused with Little Caesars Hot and Ready 5 dollar pizza. They make the pizza when you order it, it hasn't been sitting under a lamp for half an hour. The cheese gets all stringy, and I love the crust! Tonight I guess the manager was working because when he brought us the pizza he apologized for the wait (which actually seemed faster then usual) and told us he had some bread sticks coming out for us! So fun to get free goodies! We also love this place because it's big and clean and has a HUGE flat screen tv to watch. So fun when your too poor to really go all out, it feels like a night out anyway! So that's what we've been up too...being poor and chillin at home, oh the joys of grad school!

Rachel!!

Yesterday I got to say goodbye to my old roomate Rachel! She went into the MTC today and will be leaving in three weeks to go to Toronto, Canada! There couldn't be a better sister missionary out there then Sister Phillips will be!

See you soon Rachel! I'll miss you!

(yes a short post! after the last one I felt obligated...there were just too many great photos though!)

Labor Day Fun!

So this weekend we got to go to my mom's again and guess who was there waiting for us? Just the cutest little guy ever - Britton!

We went to a Salt Lake Bees baseball game on Friday. It was seriously the longest game ever but we had so much fun just sitting around and talking with everyone. My sister Jess and her husband John, and of course little Britton were all there, and Jess and I had matching shirts my mom bought us, we were so cute (not pictured)!


The fireworks at the end were totally worth waiting for, Britton wasn't even scared! Although the Lady Snap production after the game which went over the rules of the road for kids while they danced and sang like the Backstreet Boys was pretty sketchy! They were practically booed off the baseball field and everyone was cheering when the pretended to die at the end of their performance!


Britton got all dressed up on Sunday for church. We got a family photo too but not on my camera :( so you can't see how cute he was with his little bow tie on!


Then we got to hike up to the Timp caves, but didn't get inside. We even tried bribing the rangers, but they claimed the temperature inside the cave would rise too much if they went over he daily allotment of visitors. Lame-O! But there was no way we were coming back so the caves will have to remain a mystery until next year. It was a beautiful hike though and the rock all around was amazing! This is Jess and John on a serious cliff that was built up on the sides thankfully! A lot of the hike had shear drop offs, especially the last leg to the top, you could feel the vertigo setting in.


These are the sweet rocks. If you look close in this one right in the middle of the shadow is a groove - that's a fault line! (not where I'm pointing, but more to the left - I was actually trying to pry out a piece of loose rock, but Travis made me stop because he didn't want me to cause a rock slide).
Me and Jessie at the bottom of the hike right by the stream.


On Monday Mom, Jess and I went to find some cute stuff for Mom's new window office. Jess found the best witch decoration, it's holding a little sign that says "the witch is in!" So great!


Monday night we had to say our goodbyes. Britton even got dressed up for the occasion in his awesome pink Dora pajamas! (Yes, he is a cute little long blond curly haired boy in pink! We are so cruel, but he picked them out from Walmart because it's his favorite show and Grandma (Mom) will buy him anything he wants!) Too cute, if I can say so! We miss him so much already, especially when he would run to the door and say "kidy" which really meant kitty, but he said it so cute. I also loved how he would always go to Travis, even when he wouldn't go to anyone else, and once when he was real sleepy Travis asked him for a hug and he ran over and fell asleep in Travis' arms - it was the best! We love you Britton and can't wait to see you again!

a new background

I just realized that I didn't have a background anymore. Who knows how long that was going on for, my computer doesn't always load all the way so I just figured it was still out there somewhere...not so! I hate having to look for new backgrounds, it really fiddles my sticks! Everything seems so girly to me, and that would be cool if I had kids and cute little things to talk about, but since it's just me and Travis for now I like to look a little more grown up. So if anyone knows of some cool sites for free backgrounds I could check out that would be cool. For now this will do.

Lost and other things...

So lots of stuff has been going on lately. Last week we went up to visit my mom, and had the most killer time ever. We went to two Orem Owls baseball games, saw Inception for the second time, mini-golfed (which was hysterical to say the least), we saw Taylor ride her horse a couple of times, had a ton of great food (thank you mom, and Five Guys!). I caught up with Amy who's been in Thailand since January and came home for a visit! And (sorry mikensi) we met Jimmy, Mikensi and little Jae at Fat Cats for some bowling (maybe my score made me forget), only Travis and Jimmy broke 100 in the two games, I got 89 both times...so sad!

Then I came home and started my new job at Gateway Preparatory Academy. It's a lot harder then last year, I hope I can make it. But then I have to remind myself that I'm done every day at 3 o'clock and 1 o'clock on Fridays, and I don't work on weekends and I always have holidays off, and I get paid great! So other then the actual work, it's a great job!

Then this last weekend Travis' family came up to visit us. We went boating on Navajo Lake, where Travis tried to fish, but no luck this time. Then his brother broke an ore on one of the boats so Travis had to row while we held onto the other boat, all while going against the current. Needless to say he was exhausted! Then we cooked dinner and smores over a campfire. We went down to Zions National Park where we hiked to the 3 emerald pools, which weren't really that emerald but were still nice and refreshing. Then we had Costa Vida in there somewhere and some DQ blizzards too. Really fun weekend!

Now back to work, and Travis started school again on Monday. I'll be glad when Labor Day comes and we can go back up to my mom's and see my sister and little nephew!

I'll get some pictures up eventually.

I almost forgot the most important thing of all...me and Travis finished watching all the seasons of Lost! I was a little disappointed with the ending, there just seemed so many questions left unanswered. We definitely need to chat Amy!

Cafe Rio?

I haven't blogged in a long time. And we've done a lot of fun things lately, which is why I've been to busy to blog. But we went to Cafe Rio last night for the first time, and needless to say I wasn't too impressed. I would give Costa Vida higher marks for sure. They didn't have my favorite fish tacos to begin with (I know they have salmon tacos but that's not the same thing) The medium sauce was good but not quite as good and they didn't cook the enchiladas long enough, the cheese was still cold inside. The rice was also not my fave. I know everyone loves Cafe Rio, but if there is a Costa Vida close by, I would swing that way first, and it's cheaper!

Cookies!

Yes more cookies. I haven't been able to do anything lately with the dumb job of mine, but this is my last week! I'm so excited! So the most exciting thing that I have been able to do is cook some cookies. Mostly chocolate chip, but since we were running low on brown sugar and chocolate chips I went for some peanut butter ones this time. They aren't your regular peanut butter cookies either, no shortening, just good old butter, and since it did call for brown sugar I used what I had left and then supplemented the rest with honey, it makes them taste oh so delicious!


The recipe is really easy: Just a 1/2 of everything and then a little more for the flour.

1/2 c. butter or margarine
1/2 c. peanut butter
1/2 c. granulated sugar
1/2 c. brown sugar or if using honey only 1/4 c.
1/2 t. baking powder
1/2 t. baking soda
1/2 t. vanilla
1 egg
1 1/4 c. flour
and some extra sugar

Mix the butter and peanut butter together first. (since I don't have an electric mixer i cheated and melted mine for 20 sec. in the microwave and then stirred!). Then add the sugars, or honey, baking powder and soda in. Then your egg and vanilla. Then your flour (I only did half the recipe and i needed to add a little more flour so you might for a real batch too). Then roll into 1 in balls and roll in the sugar. Flatten with a fork and then 7-9 min at 375*. I used the rest of my chocolate chips and melted them in a double boiler and then put it on the cookies. So Good!

Long Overdue Fourth of July

I know I'm a terrible blogger. I've been so busy with work, working terrible hours, and since Travis did the last post I think I was secretly hoping he'd do all the posts and I wouldn't have to bother with it anymore. Guess I'm not that lucky. Here are some pictures from our 4th of July that we spent with my mom in Lindon. We had so much fun, and good food! And as a final treat we went to a Salt Lake Bee's Baseball game! We love baseball games! And we had funnel cake too, which is everyone's favorite!


Here's Cydnee, mom, and Taylor! Aren't they cute!


And me and mom!! (I forgot to take one of me and Travis, woops!)


It's Mr. Snuggles! He couldn't really move in the suit, but they did throw little snuggle bears out the the crowd, but since it was cheerleaders that threw them, they only reached the first two rows!


The Bee mascot came to our row, and as our family would remember...where's Britton when you need him!


We lost the game, or I should say the Bees lost the game, but it was still so much fun! The best part was the crazy guy who sat behind us. That's always what we look for when we go to games, people who will say anything! My favorite line of the night was when a women won a $10 coupon to Harmons during the 7th inning stretch. He said "You've won $10 off any purchase at Harmons....Saturday night only....at midnight....when you spend $300 or more....at the Harmons in Logan!" We about died laughing. Later, before we left he told Travis and I that our children would be models because we both have high cheek bones! I hope he wasn't just making fun of us! It was semi-embarrassing.

Oh, and there were fireworks!! Greatest night! Except the 3 hour drive home in the middle of the night so that Travis could get to his first class at 7 am. Hope you had a great 4th too!

I'm new to the whole blog thing so this is my trial post to see if it works. Erin and I went fishing Near Cedar breaks Utah and we found a nice river/stream to fish in. I caught two fish!! Erin also thought it was fun even though she didn't catch anything. We bought our fishing pole from walmart for 12 bucks and it seems to work fine for me. Hopefully we can go more often..

Cookies

I made cookies last week and I never have my own recipes so I always just end up googling a recipe and hope that the one I pick this time will be good. Well I actually found one that was surprisingly delicious! They even stayed nice and moist for a few days while we slowly worked our way though the batch. Yummy!

And some Chimmy-Chongas too! Yes my life has gotten so boring that I take pictures of my food while Travis looks at me and asks me what I'm doing and then starts to laugh! Oh well, I'll have a job soon enough!

Here's the link for the cookies: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchens/chocolate-chip-cookies-recipe4/index.html

I don't know how to make it connect directly, but copy and paste always works!

Summer Games!

So here in Cedar City they are holding the Utah Summer Games this year. Tonight was the opening ceremonies. The fireworks were pretty epic, almost the best I've ever seen. Definitely the best end to a fireworks show, I thought I might go deaf and blind! Enjoy!


I also realized while I was taking tons of photos that the camera is on a time delay to capture as much light as possible so the fireworks will show up in the photo. Which made me realize that I could take this:


And do this:

I thought it looked pretty cool anyway.

St. George and Sundays

One more post. I'm a little behind on posting, sorry, not that anyone even looks at this, I don't think anyone even knows I have a blog still, oh well! On Saturday we went down to St. George to go to the temple, very nice I might say!

And we took a walk around campus on Sunday (trying to get our minds off of fasting!) It's like a forest in some parts!

Here are some cool buildings - one is the Art Gallery (which isn't hiring),

and this is the sweetness Library!


And this is Travis' Business Building...talk about the ugliest building on the block!


And this is our apartment building. Our apartment is the one on the top left, with the bike. Yeah!