Saturday, November 6, 2010

Dew Tour

So did you notice that I managed to gloss over some pretty significant happenings in my last two blog posts? Yeah me too. Shad and I celebrated 2 years of marriage in September and Shad also celebrated his 28th birthday in September too.

So I’m going to say the fact Shad’s birthday was almost 2 months ago and that it’s 2:00 in the morning explains why I have no idea what we actually did to celebrate his birthday. I know I bought him his new Ipod since the one I got him for his birthday 2 years ago died a couple months ago. And yes I did wait until after he visited the Apple Store to see if he needed a new one before I thought about what to get him for his birthday. That’s not being a bad wife, that’s called planning people. Now not remembering what we did for his birthday that might mean I’m a bad wife.

For our anniversary we went up to Park City and did the Alpine Slide and Coaster. As we were driving up the canyon, I was shocked to find out Shad had never been to the Alpine Slide before (Seriously, what did his family do for fun?) so it was his first time and he was nervous. While we were in line for the chair lift a group of 3 guys butted in front of us in line to get on the lift, one looked like Shawn White but I wasn’t sure. When we got off and realized one of the guys was a photographer and that the Dew Tour was in town that weekend, our suspicions were confirmed. Since Shawn wanted to go down the slide with the photographer filming him, that left his friend from the Dew Tour to race little old me down the mountain. A quiet girl Mormon engineer vs. some kid from the Dew Tour, it should be no contest, right? Wrong! I kicked that kid’s butt and apologized when we got off the slide as I heard Shawn and the photographer lay into him for letting a girl beat him. After taking a ride on the Alpine Coaster, we drove into town and had dinner then stopped at the outlet stores for some quick shopping. It was a fantastic anniversary.

Then I did some coverage – my favorite type – backshifts! We took our trip to Escalante. Shad went camping with the boy scouts and Jake and I had a photoshoot for our next album. You can see the pictures from that here.

I did some more coverage. We had our Halloween party (I promise next year I will remember to take pictures). I got to do some more coverage. We finally made it down to SLC to see Annie’s new house – it’s seriously so cute! I couldn’t be more excited for them! And to make it even better they had a Halloween party of their own so we got to see so many friends I haven’t seen in the longest time. So fun!

That pretty much catches me up to this week. Whew. Maybe next time I’ll have a picture of Dublin in his Halloween costume. I made him wear it for at least 3 days straight so you would think during that time I would have thought to take a picture of him. Nope. I guess he’ll just have to wear it one more time for me. When I have kids, they’ll put their costumes on after Halloween so I can take a picture of them too, right?

Monday, October 18, 2010

Escalante

I promise at some point this blog will get back to our day to day boring lives it used to be instead of a bunch of pictures of me in the wilderness without make up. Until then, here are pictures from the trip to Escalante we took over conference weekend.

You know you would have sat on the giant lizard and insisted someone take a picture of you too.

Sometimes I'm a little irresponsible when it's warm outside and I can wear flip flops. I forgot to grab my sneakers before we left on our first hike. Luckily for my hiking in flip flops is no big deal.

Cryptobiotic Soil!

Naptime.

Mmmm. Petrified wood.

Hiking to Calf Creek Falls.

Waterfall!

Shad took the effort to hike closer to the waterfall so we had to take his picture. You know, to prove that he did it.

My arm runing Jen's picture of the swirly rock.

I make that rock look good.

Jen's self portriat.

We climbed into that hole all by ourselves.

Naptime part 2.




Stream hiking - it was freezing and had fish in it. Gross!

I only got my one shoe wet once.

Hiking!

To end our trip, it decided to rain the entire night. Here we are waiting out the storm in the tent.

Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Sailing...takes me away

I’m back to document yet another little trip we’ve taken recently. Over labor day weekend, we finally got to go sailing with our friends Jen and Jared. We’ve been waiting literally years to take this trip and have tried to plan sailing trips before but because of one reason or another were not able to follow through with actually sailing. We went on other vacations instead – see our Moab and Great Basin trips last year.

Going into this trip we all knew it was a bit risky. Jared tends to have adventures when he goes sailing. We all went fully expecting an adventure of some sort and hoping it wouldn’t be too major. It’s never a good sign when you’re driving to the airport and your soon to be captain asks if you have to be back at work Wednesday (we were scheduled to fly home Tuesday evening).

We arrived in Long Beach Friday evening and took a Taxi to the marina, got settled in for the night and went to bed early in preparation for sailing the next morning. Our initial plan was to sail Saturday morning to Avalon on Catalina island, spend Saturday evening on the island and Sunday day snorkeling and other things. Monday we were to go around to the back of the island for more ocean/beach fun then sail back to LA Monday night just incase we were delayed a bit we left plenty of buffer time to make our Tuesday evening flight.

Saturday morning the girls got to walk to the grocery store to get food and supplies. The boys needed to go to the marine store to get a few parts the boat needed. No big deal, right? For Jen and I we got to take a 3 mile walk to the store and called a Taxi to take us back to the marina since we had perishable items. The boys got to take a 6 mile run to the marine store and a 6 mile walk back. I’m so glad I’m a girl.


We got this train to honk at us while we were walking. That's worth at least 1,000,000 points more than a semi truck.

Waiting for the taxi.

Once we were back from our errands, it was time to set sail.
Jen found out on a previous boat trip that she gets sea sick, Shad also knows that he gets sea sick too. Even though they took their drugs like they were supposed to, they still got really sick. I was actually fine which surprised me – I’ve recently developed getting car sick over the past year. Why, no one knows.
Here I am enjoying a PB & J sandwich en-route to Catalina. Jen was jealous I was getting to eat so she took a picture.
We got to Catalina by 5ish and because of the holiday weekend, there were no moorings left. We opted to drop our anchor outside of the harbor and take the water taxi into the island.
After give Shad and Jen sometime to get their appetites back, we enjoyed a wonderful dinner and walked around for a bit. Then we headed back to the water taxi to take us back to the boat. That’s when things got interesting.
The water taxi took us back to the spot we had left our boat, only our boat wasn’t there. By this time it was dark outside so then Jared started explaining what kind of boat it was and the water taxi guy started thinking where he had seen boats like ours. Luckily he recalled seeing a boat like ours way out tied to a buoy with the harbor patrol next to it. He took us out there and low and behold there was our boat, tied to a buoy with a not too happy harbor patrol man next to it.

As it turns out, our anchor wasn’t exactly set properly and the boat started to drift dangerously close to some other boats near it. The other boats decided to call the harbor master to come take care of the boat that was trying to “bump and grind” (that’s a direct quote from the harbor master – our boat is dirty) against the other boats.

For some reason that still eludes me, the harbor master was not able to get our anchor up and decided to just cut it off. He then towed it to the buoy in the middle of nowhere to keep it safe. It turns out the boat didn’t have current registration stickers or proof of insurance so he suspected it was a derelict boat. Luckily though, he felt bad enough about cutting the anchor that he didn’t ticket us for the registration or insurance. He let us use an emergency mooring for the night and told us he would be back at 9:00 to check on us.

At that point it was decision time. Should we stay in Avalon for the next day or two and go snorkeling like we had planned or just go back to LA? The rest of our plans were out since we no longer had an anchor. Not wanting to tempt fate anymore, we all voted to go back to LA. Plus that meant we wouldn’t have to deal with sick Jen and Shad for the next two days.

Mmmm. Marshmallows in the morning time.

Motoring back to LA - the wind was seriously lacking.

Catalina before we left.

I'm a sailor.

Jared is too.

Naptime on the boat.

Ocean

Sometimes you have to get your foot into it.

Sea lions.

Pretty cute picture of us.

Boats at the marina.

Playing at the beach.

It's a tradition. Shad and Jared build a sand castle, Jen and I destroy it when it's done.

Jen finishing off the brownie at Yardhouse.

Us at dinner in Long Beach.

For my birthday Jen and Jared got me some bump-its (for the big hair I have always dreamed of), SPAM (because I’ve never had SPAM) and a booty pop (because I am a white girl). It was like a made for TV wonderland on the boat that night. And now I look so good all the time.

Tuesday we took the boat out one more time and sailed around the harbor for a few hours. It’s too bad we had to go back early, we were getting pretty good at sailing by Tuesday but that might have been because in the harbor it was smooth and Jen and Shad didn’t get sick. Whatever.

Thursday, August 19, 2010

D to the C

I can’t believe August is almost over. The kids in our neighborhood go back to school next week. Where did summer go? I’m back to share our annual trip. This year Shad and I went to Washington D.C. for vacation. Shad had never been so that alone I think was worth the trip. We spent 8 days in our nation’s capitol and had a splendid time. Here are the pictures to prove it.

The place we stayed was literally 1 block away from Capitol hill and the Library of Congress. Shad didn't believe me when I first pointed to the building across the street and told him it was the Library of Congress.

Here we are in front of the Library. I finally invested in a mini tripod for my camera so I was actually able to take a few pictures of us.

I think this was my favorite building we visited in DC. The mosaic tile work on the floor, the ornate ceilings. Just beautiful.

Here we are in the Library, I cut of Shad's head but was too lazy to try again.

Sunday morning while we were walking to the Smithsonian I made Shad walk past the capitol so I could take a few pictures without a million other tourists around.

See? It was just us.

Also while on the capitol grounds we found this weird Asian looking building with a fountain in the middle. I guessed it was build around a natural spring since there were all sorts of plants and stuff. Shad didn't believe me until I made him look on his map. Low and behold, it was a natural spring. I'm too smart for my own good.


Of course the Smithsonian was loads of fun. The Natural History Museum was first.

Then the air and space museum got boring after a bit. I do think I have what it takes to be a stewardess though.

This was in the Native American museum. I'm not sure why but that's where it was. Also as a side note, if you are eating at the Smithsonian, it's worth it to walk down to the Native American museum. The food there is delicious and way better than any of the other museums.

Here I am outside the Smithsonian waiting for Shad to bring me a drink. I'm just a little bit spoiled sometimes.

The view of DC from Arlington Cemetery. I'm really glad I suggested to Shad we visit here.

There's something about seeing all those head stones from so long ago and the recent ones as well that really put into perspective what people have sacrificed for our country.

While wandering around the Dupont Circle area, we visited Woodrow Wilson's house he moved into after he left office. I think this was one of our favorite stops. We even got to play his piano and the old man that gave us a tour was so ideal.

Here's the White House. Shad and I did get to do a tour but because our Congressman didn't warn us not to bring cameras, one of us had to wait outside with our cameras while the other went through and then switch places. Kind of dumb.

Here I am trying to entertain myself while waiting for Shad to do his tour of the White House. I was literally surrounded by 50 short Chinese people while I was taking this picture.

After the White House, it was time for the monuments.

Last time I was in DC, they were just building the WWII monument. It was nice to see the finished result.

Vietnam Memorial

Lincolin

Korean War

While sitting at the Korean War memorial, I found my dream job. So ideal. That guy gets to go play in fountains everyday and gets paid for it.

We even went back to see the monuments at night and we both got to see fireflies for the very first time. Why don't we have them in Utah? They are so cool!


At are restaurant in Chinatown. I ordered the Sweet and Sour Chicken instead.

And lastly, non-trip related picture. Before we went to DC we took the dog up to Causey Reservoir to swim. After he was done, he opted to sit on his towel instead of the rock. Is he my dog or what?!