Ahhh, a Glorious Weekend!

While studying in the Geology Lab, a few weeks ago, I saw that there was an upcoming hike to Cave Falls in Yellowstone with the Geology Society for last Saturday, the 18th. So I, always looking for a reason to get out of Rexburg, suggested to Rob that we go. Never mind the fact that I wanted to get out of town for a few hours, I figured it would be fun for Rob to see some of his friends from school, since he's been off track since July. Let's just say that it was incredibly beautiful, an utterly perfect day, and completely disorganized!

Here is a shot of the falls from the parking lot. Cave Falls is only 20 feet high but reaches 250 feet across the Falls River in the southwest corner of Yellowstone National Park. It was about an hours drive from Rexburg. We especially enjoyed the trip because we took school vehicles, and didn't have to drive!!

Here is what looks like a pregnant tree! It even had a belly button, and what looked like two separate legs.

Here we are in front of Bechler Falls, about 1.5 miles up-river from Cave Falls.

Aren't we so cute and nuggly?!?!

I think this would be a great place to take engagement pictures. I was almost too afraid of falling into the water to jump out to the rock--it was about a 2.5 foot gap--but with some help from a log, I made it. I only wish Rob's eyes were open in this picture. It's so cute!

Anytime anyone would like to come visit us, we would love to have an excuse to go back. In fact, from this trail, it's only 31.8 walking miles to Old Faithful--Rob and I were thinking we'd like to hike it next summer--anyone want to join us? OR even be willing to drop us off here, and then meet up with us the next day at Old Faithful?

Like Mother, Like Daughter

A few weeks ago, I was sitting my my parents living room going through a box of old photos that my dad had recently found. Because I have no pictures of myself as a child, I brought a stack home with me, so that I could scan them, and then give them back to my parents. I expect that a good portion of my blog posts in the near future will be of pictures of me as a youngin. :)

One of the best finds though, is this picture of my mom and dad at their reception. They are cutting the cake, preparing for what I always affectionately called, "the shoving contest". My favorite part, though, is the look on my mother's face (not to mention my dad's ruffly tuxedo shirt *snicker snicker*) :

It kinda reminds me of the look on my face at my wedding . . .

Oh wait, not that one . . . here it is:

. . . not to mention this look:

"Holy canolli! That's a lotta cake!" Well, it actually wasn't cake, Rob and I aren't too fond of cake, so we had a "rice crispie" cake. The bottom layer was made out of fruity-pebbles, the middle out of rice crispies, and the top coco-crispies. It was fantastic!

Yum! And if you keep paying attention, you'll see the rice-crispie thing come up again in the pictures . . . they are my FAVORITE, afterall. :)

A months work . . .

I accomplished a typical months work today, in about a half hour, as witnessed in this email:

*****************************************

Dear Kristin,

I would like to inform you that we have received your fast graduation application in the admissions office and it has been approved. You may register for your Winter semester classes when your credit level allows.

Thank you,

Stephani

*****************************************

Happiness Prevails!

EDIT: What this means is that I can 1, register for winter semester--which I need to attend at least twice as a Horticulture major (I was accepted as a summer/fall track student--which means I would not typically be able to attend winter semesters), and 2, continuously attend school until I graduate, therefore signifigantly decreasing the amount of time Rob and I will need to live in Rexburg--by a year and a half.

What it really comes down to though, is that Rob and I should be able to graduate in the same semester. So once we are both done here, we can immediately move on to wherever Rob chooses to go to Grad school. THAT is happiness!

More Projects!

As of late, I haven't been updating the blog as often as I would like. There are many reasons for this, but what it really comes down to is that I spend way too much time doing homework. For example, I spent 9 hours on this design for my Flower ID class. The plot is a part of the school's demonstration gardens that will be planted, I assume, sometime next spring.

Yeah. Nine hours of my life--displayed on that piece of paper. I know, it's sad. What a waste of an entire Saturday afternoon and evening.

This, on the other hand, is a work of art that I assembled in Flower Center last Thursday. We were to create a centerpiece--so I did an oblong design with pink larkspur, daisy mums, and salal. I think it turned out great, and am now displaying it proudly on my bar.

It only took half an hour, at most, and was much more exciting, fun, and rewarding. Not to mention I get to look at pretty flowers all week. :)

I do have some pretty awesome things that I still want to post, but I've got to scan some pictures first . . . and I haven't gotten that far yet. So, hopefully I'll find some time to breathe this week, and all you faithful blog-readers of mine will have some great entertainment soon. Until then . . .

Oh, and someone mistook me for an eighteen-year-old's mother today. Sadly enough, it's not the first time this has happened. It's the third. Do I really look like I'm 40? Sad day.

Holy Crap! I'm SO Funny!

Ok, I know, it's a pompous title, but hopefully you'll come to appreciate why I'm laughing so hard at myself right now.

The story starts out this morning. I had gotten out my gloves, because I was going to take a bike ride, and it's been quite chilly in the mornings here; I didn't want to freeze my fingertips off during my ride. Thankfully though, it had warmed up this morning, and since I prefer to ride without them I left the gloves behind. For my bike ride, I started off going to the dry cleaners. Rob's zipper on his favorite coat broke last spring, and rather than getting a whole new coat, I figured we could jsut get a new zipper installed.

So I got to the dry cleaners, where they do alterations too, and asked for a new zipper to be put in. The employee told me that all I actually needed was a new zipper pull, and she could have the coat fixed in about five minutes. COOL!

As I was waiting, I saw that the cleaners also had collar stays for sale, and since I didn't take out Rob's collar stays the first time I washed a shirt with them, (how am I supposed to know they needed to come out) and they broke, I've been needing to buy him some. I love buying him stupid little gifts like this, and was delighted with the thought of presenting him with them.

So, the coat got fixed. I continued my bike ride for another 40 minutes, and eventually came home. Now, since I have class this afternoon from 3:00-6:00 and Rob is going to beat me home, I wanted to set out his coat as a surprise. Originally I was jsut going to lay it out on the couch, and then I noticed the pillow laying there . . . so I zipped up the coat around the pillow and stood it up. It looked good . . . but it wasn't perfect, yet. I then took a smaller pillow and stuffed it in the hood, making it stand up. The "head" was tilted a bit, which gave it a little sass . . . and then I saw my gloves. I stuffed the gloves in the arm holes, and made a peace sign out of the fingers. In the pocket of the coat I put the wrapped collar stays.

So when Rob gets home, this is what he'll see:

New zipper pull? Four dollars.
New collar stays? Two dollars.
Me dressing up pilliows in the fixed coat, throwing a peace sign? Priceless.

I am one crazy girl.

Just So We're Clear

I figure its about time for an update.

This was on the floor of the bathroom stall I was using this afternoon. I'm not one of those queasy girls that can't handle spiders or anything, but it was a little disturbing. It was a HUGE spider. A smart spider too, since it found it's way inside. Today the temerature is about 20 degrees colder than last week. Survival of the fittest, I guess.

Yesterday Rob and I cleaned out all the heels of bread (16 of them) from our fridge and went to the nature park to feed the ducks. It was awesome. Those of you that know how much Rob loves ducks will understand that we had a great time. I used to use the heels of bread for french toast, until I realized how many calories syrup has. The ducks need the calories more than us!

I, with the other flower center girls made 200 corsages and bouttineers each this weekend for BYU-I's Presidents Club. I then spent the better part of my Saturday afternoon pinning said flowers on people. It was fun, but I should have not worn heels.

Rob and I went to see Buckets and Tap Shoes preform Saturday night. It was pretty good.

I ended up dropping my weightlifting class. I signed up for it initally to get a routine going and keep me motivated to keep up with the gym, but decided afterall that since Rob and I already have a good thing going, why mess with it? The teacher also had me paired up with a girl that could barely bench the bar--but made a big deal about "pairing up Ponies with Clydesdales". He refused to pair me with a guy--which would be a better lifting partner for me. Honestly, he kinda rubbed me the wrong way just because I'm a *girl* and it got my blood boiling. Oh well. Rob and I will keep up with our routine and I've got the best lifting partner of all. :)

Weightlifting

As readers of my blog you might have been able to tell that I have recently taken up weightlifting. I started in June and have been doing a specific routine, Starting Strength the last month or so. Looking back at my past experiences with weight rooms I can remember myself walking into the Snow College weight room seven years ago, and barely being able to bench press the bar, weighing in at 45 pounds.

The last few months of working with the weights have paid off though. In June I maxed out the bench press at 105; meaning that I couldn't do one rep at my weight higher than 105.

So to make sure I continue progressing and getting my butt to the gym I signed up for a weightlifting class this semester. Today we were maxing out our bench press and squat weights so that [I'm assuming] the teacher will be able to pair us up with partners who can lift about the same amount of weight.

I maxed out my bench press today at 125, and my squat at 205. I must say that I am indeed very pleased with these numbers. I've gone up 20 pounds in the bench, and although I've never maxed my squat before, as a girl 205 has got to mean something pretty good, right? I listened in to the other six girls report their numbers, and I was way above any of the rest of them, even ones that had taken the class before. So, strength wise I'm feeling great today. Heath wise however, I have a cold. :(

School's in! YEah!

Today was the first day back and it went considerably well. I arrived on campus about 7:15, spent 7.5 hours in class, bought my books, ate only an apple from the school orchard and a banana and peanut butter I'd brought with me, and finally left campus at 5:45. I then walked the 1.2 miles home.

I am exhausted and can't wait to go to sleep.

And The Verdict?

For those of you who contributed on the Ideas? blog a few days ago, I thank you. I would have to agree with Lisa in that it was probably a Buttercup squash. According to a site that I found buttercup squash can be subsititued for sweet potatoes in many recipes, which got me thinking . . . I just found a recipe for sweet potato curry that I'd been wanting to try . . . I could use the squash in it since it's unlikely Rob will EVER eat any of it without it being involved in something delicious like a curry . . . So I bought some orange juice and broke in the crock pot we were given for our wedding--almost 17 months ago. :) This is what it looked like inside:

Looks perfectly respectable as a squash goes, right?

Here she is hollowed out. Still perfectly acceptable.

I decided to peel it with my potato-peeler instead of trying to shave the skin off with my santoku knife because the skin was quite tender. I was a bit surprised at how "squashy" it smelled. I was still a bit hesitant to try out a new recipe on it, so I sliced off a bit and nuked it for a few minutes. It tasted okay so I was ready to give it a shot.

The outcome was DELICIOUS! I did add in the one sweet potato we had in the house so I could see what that would be like, and it turned out great. Next time I make it I'll use only sweet potatoes, as they were sweeter than the squash; but what is the likelyhood I'll ever come upon a buttercup squash again, really?

So thanks for the votes people! I'm glad it wasn't a watermelon that ate another watermelon or anything having to do with a cucumber. Also, you should try out the recipe! I'm a curry LOVER and like it HOT, but this was really mild. Next time I'll be using more curry for sure!

R "Mountain"

Since Rob and I had no real plans for our Labor Day weekend besides doing some laundry and having our home teachers over, we decided that we actually needed to get OUT of the apartment for awhile. It took a few hours of brainstorming and being lazy to actually come up with a solution, but we finally got out. We decided we'd like to go hiking, but since it was a bit stormy and cold we didn't want to go too far; so we ended up at Menan Buttes, a short drive from Rexburg.


The last time we'd hiked up the "mountain" was July 2007. Rob was going for a field trip with one of his geology classes and I tagged along. For me it ended up being a disaster. It was a hot and sticky summer day, and I was an out of shape sack of chub. It took me almost 40 minutes to get up to the caldera rim with four stops of at least five minutes each with me huffing and puffing and downing water. I felt bad that I'd come because I was just holding Rob up and we were the tail end of the expedition.

Thankfully with the last few months of me trying to "get fit" yesterdays experience was SOOO much better! It was a cold, overcast day and that could have made a difference, but we reached the caldera rim this time in only 21 minutes with only one short water break. It was like night and day in comparison.

Here I am at the highest point on the south side of the caldera. It was SUPER windy and we even got sprinkled on for a few minutes, but it was so refreshing.

This is a view to the East of the Butte.

This is my amazing hubby Rob. He inspires me so much! I'm really glad he convinced me to give the hike another try. I was hesitant of course at first, scared that it would be a crappy experience again; thankfully he convinced me and we had a GREAT hike. Thanks babe.

Here we are at the highest point on the south rim. Windblown and chilly--but happy. :) After reaching the top we decided to hike all the way around the caldera. It was really nice.

This is a shot of the Snake River Plain west of the caldera. Can you say desolate?

This shot is from the same place, only facing East looking across the caldera and out into the productive farmland of Eastern Idaho.

All in all, we hiked just over 2.5 miles up and around the caldera then back down. At our highest point, we estimate that we elevated about 550 feet. I'd almost like to go back again next weekend for a repeat hike before school starts up again. Anyone else want to come?

Ideas?

his afternoon Rob went downstairs to ask our neighbors if they had a power drill we could use. I waited patiently upstairs for his arrival, and instead of a drill he came in with a large zuchinni, two summer squash, and this little beauty:


The problem is that we have no idea what it is, or how to cook it.


Any suggestions? My Mom thinks I should disect it and see what it looks like inside to see how to cook it. I'm not sure I'm ready to eat it yet though . . .

What a Great Week!

Ok, I'll admit it. After spending a week in Sandy with the fam I was hesitant to come back to Rexburg. Had it not been for Rob's birthday last Friday (which was AWESOME, BTW) I would have stayed in Sandy longer to keep myself from being locked up in the apartment for the last two weeks of "summer" before school starts on September 8th.

But to be completely honest, it's been a great week! The week in Sandy REALLY did the trick and got me out of the cabin fever slump. I don't feel like I've been doing anything all that different from before either. Still reading, napping, watching too much tv, interwebbing, riding my bike, and lifting weights. It's been REALLY nice to be able to lift weights again. I'd strained my wrist a few weeks back and had to take it easy, and I think that was one of the hardest things to deal with of all.

In reference to all the questions regarding my last post, sadly we didn't get any of the coconut cream pie ice cream, for two reasons. 1.) We were actually out being social with some friends and the place closed before we got there, and 2.) Turns out it wasn't actually coconut cream pie ice cream day. It was Twix ice cream day--which even though Twix is both of our favorite candy bar, the ice cream wasn't so great. Turns out I was out so early in the morning that the flavor of the day sign had not been changed from Saturday yet. Coconut cream pie was SATURDAY'S flavor. Oh well. Not like we REALLY needed it anyway. :)

So school starts in 10 days and I'm pretty psyched. I'm registered for 15 credits and feel up to the challenge once again. Most of my classes are on Mon, Wed, Fri; I only have my weightlifting class on Tues and Thurs which gets over at 8:45 am . . . so I'll definitely have time to get work done during the week. I even feel just about ready to ride my bike up the hill each day; last night I did it without TOO much heaving and hoing. YAY! It's been good for me to make the ride every day instead of just once a week. :)

Now as for the upcoming three day weekend, we've got no plans. Anyone want to come experience the wilds of Idaho and play with us?

Coconut Cream Pie . . .

This morning as Rob was leaving for work I like normal kissed him goodbye at the door and stuck my head outside to watch him leave. The smell of that sweet dewy summer morning air was intoxicating and I decided then and there I needed to get out in it. I quickly finished my cream of wheat and started some laundry so I could enjoy the morning splendor.

I decided to take my trusty bike for a ride up to BYU-I's campus. I'm trying to prepare myself to ride my bike to school (which BTW starts in two weeks--YAY!!) and since three times a week my day starts at 7:45 in the Benson building I'm working up to getting all the way up that hill without stopping, wheezing, or sweating myself chilly. I did it without stopping this morning, but the other two are still a working progress. :)

After climbing the hill to the Benson I rode around campus, dropped off Breaking Dawn at the library so the next Bella and Edward crazed girl can check it out, and checked out The Host. After some more riding on campus I decided to go downtown since I wasn't ready to go home yet and I found myself at the plasma donation center . . . wary of the last experience I almost didn't go in, but the temptation of $40 this time overtook me.

I told them I'd be using my right arm since it had the best track record and all seemed to be going just fine . . . until the phlebotomist went for the WRONG VEIN in my arm. *BREATHE* I told myself . . . *just breathe* . . . he called another guy over to correct his mistake and after a few more minutes of digging for the correct vein we hit blood . . . good right? Well by the time blood was flowing I was told there was a clot in the line . . . oh gosh.

"You know, I'd rather go home now."

"You don't want to try your left arm?"

"Oh no. It was a complete and utterly painful experience we tried that last time. The bruise only finally healed yesterday. I'd much rather go home now?"

"Yeah, we'll give you $5 though for sticking you . . . Sorry. "

"Check."

So, it took 30 minutes and I made $5 buckaroonies. At least the bike ride was refreshing and I found out that the flavor of the day at our favorite ice cream place in town is coconut cream pie, so Rob and I can go for a walk tonight and the $5 will meet it's end. :) It's so delicious, it's totally worth it.

My only regret from all this is that I have to wait 2 hours from the end of my "donation" to take a shower. *Sigh*

When in Sandy

I haven't been as good with my updates this last week because I'm for once not at home being tempted by my computer all day long. After a weekend hanging out with Rob's brother and his family I got left behind at my parents house while Rob went back up to Rexburg because he has to work, and I had some MAJOR cabin fever going on. There are only a few weeks left in the school break, but I couldn't stand being at home alone one more day.

So I'm in Sandy. It's been nice, but I do miss my honey. :( Here are a few of the things I've done/will be keeping myself busy with.

I've finished Breaking Dawn and started reading The Host. I thought it was a FANTASTIC ending to the Twilight series!

Jessie and I went on a great adventure involving a sleepover with another best friend from high school, trax, and not having enough cash to pay for trax . . . I stooped as low as rummaging through my 18 year old sister Teri's room to look for more, but could only find a quarter.

Teri and I went shopping at the mall. That was weird.

We also went swimming. That was awesome.

I've gone grocery shopping with my mom--which I LOVE doing. We're going to IKEA tonight so I can finally buy a shoe horn and garlic press. (I'm SO EXCITED! I LOVE IKEA!) And since I doubt Rob will read this before I get home, I'm also going to look for large cereal bowls for him. If you do read it honey, please let me know?

I'm going out to breakfast today and lunch tomorrow with Megan from Virginia and Kelly from New York.

I'll be hanging out with three of my four nieces today, and we're probably going swimming. FUN!

Tonight my Mom and I are going to put flowers on my Aunt Betty's grave. She would have been 70 today.

And something that I'm looking forward to--Rob is doing a little redecorating of our apartment while I'm gone. I can't wait to see what it turns out to be!

Worst Donation Ever

So I've been donating plasma the last week or so to earn a little extra money on the side, right? It's 30 bucks the first time of the week, and 40 the second. 70 extra dollars a week is nice for anyone, but especially us right now where Rob is driving 60 miles a day to and from work, and hey--it's his birthday this month--I'm trying to earn some cash so I can buy him fun things. :)

For those that have never donated plasma I'll explain the process. Basically about a pint of your blood is drawn from a vein in either arm. Then a machine separates the red blood cells from your plasma. The plasma is put into a donation container and once all has been separated from the red blood cells, they are put back into your body via the same vein. Usually a painless process, it normally takes three draw and return rotations and about forty minutes for my full donation.

Well it's been a breeze thus far. I ride my bike into town, "work" for an hour, and go deposit my money. It's nice. This morning however was horrific.

I got to the center early today to avoid the afternoon crowd--8:21. I was called up and had my blood tested, temperature and blood pressure taken, reviewed all the legal mumbo jumbo and was on the donation floor by 8:30. When it was my turn to get hooked up to the machine the phlebotomist asked which arm I wanted to use, and I'd already decided to use my left since my right wrist had been giving me some trouble the last few days. That was my first mistake.

Since it's been about four years since I'd donated from my left arm the guy had a hard time first of all finding a vein to use--eventually he found two good ones. He decided to use one that I hadn't donated from before which made it VERY painful when he put the donation needle in me. BTW--HAVE YOU SEEN THOSE NEEDLES? They are HUGE! Anyway. He got me hooked up to the machine and about three minutes into the donation my vein went crazy. He tried moving the position of the needle around to get a better flow--poking and prodding my vein. Moving the needle in and out . . . it was painful. He tried for a few minutes and after digging around in my arm eventually we decided to change arms.

So, another phlebotomist gets called over to jab a new needle in my right arm. He gets the needle right in, and hooks me back up to the machine. Things are looking up. The first full pint of blood was drawn, plasma separated just fine, and then as the red blood cells were being returned to me the problems grew. Apparently there was a clot somewhere in my donation line and it ws causing the machine to stop returning blood to me. It took a few minutes for the phlebotomist to come assist me and eventually after more poking and prodding of my vein, massaging the donation line to loosen any clotting, and eventually manually cranking the blood back into my body my blood was returned.

The machine started my second draw and was working just fine. My blood flow was normal and things looked good again; that is until the second return. Again, right as the red blood cells were being returned to me the machine stopped again. CRAP! BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEEEPPP the machine went. Eventually someone came over to figure me out, and nothing worked. Not painfully moving the needle around in my arm, not trying to massage and clear the line . . . it was awful.

My original phlebotomist came back to assist because the other guy gave up. Ultimately he again hand cranked the machine so that my blood could be returned. Without doing this I would not be able to donate again within the next 8 weeks. It was painful and lengthy. My arm burned, especially below the donation site where my wrist has been hurting. It took forever, but I got my blood back. We decided then that I wouldn't try for that third blood draw and return rotation. The needle was eventually taken out of my arm. By this point it was 10:50, I felt a little woosy, and had to ride my bike home. Needless to say I rode slow and now I'm taking it easy at home.

Oh, and I'm adding this because of Sarah's comment--you better believe I got paid after all that poking and prodding!

I Like to Ride My Bicycle . . .

This is the route of my bike ride today (The blue and pink dots are where I stopped for quick water breaks):


6.3 miles, which looks like a decent ride, right? Well, here is an illustration of the elevation I was working with:

Turns out it was an AWESOME ride! One of my goals this month was to get to the top of that freaking hill on my bike, and even though this morning when I set out I figured I'd go ride on campus, and maybe the neighborhood directly east of it, I decided to take on the hill. I've got to admit, I feel pretty accomplished. It's only 305 feet of elevation gain, but it felt like a monster! What a great ride!

So . . .

. . . it's August. I haven't posted yet because it's been a pretty boring month so far. I even opened a "new post" page yesterday and stared blankly at the screen for about three minutes thinking of something to write. Apparently my creative juices were not working yet. I can't guarantee anything now either, but I can't sleep (again) so I'm trying to do something productive and don't want to read The Return of the King which I started last week . . . there are a few noteworthy things though . . .

I've been riding my bike almost daily, it makes me feel happy--and worn out!

I rode my bike up to the Benson building on campus on Monday--which is up a decent sized hill. I'd like to be able to get all the way there without all the sweating and huffing and puffing though . . .

I decided it was about time I make some money while I'm on my "summer break" and donated plasma on Tuesday. I'm going to do it again today if my iron levels are up to par.

I'm using the money to buy Rob birthday gifts. :)

I did 4 sets of 5 reps at 95 pounds tonight on the bench press and squats, and 95 pound deadlifts. (and I can't sleep? WTF?)

Rob loves his job. I love that he loves his job. I however don't like being home alone all day. I wish I had more friends in Rexburg to play with.

I've begun showering at night. It's weird, but my hair looks great in the morning!

I bought new athletic shoes last weekend--my old ones were over 4 years old and have been retired.

Please leave comments. They make me happy--and it's nice to know that multiple people are actually reading this.

I think I might be able to sleep now, so I'm off.

I Love The Discovery Channel . . .

Ok. I've wanted to blog about this for awhile now. And those of you that watch the Discovery channel MUST agree with me, they've got some pretty kick-a commercials. When this commercial came out I would (and sometimes still do) sing along--to the point that Rob started muting the TV when it came on because he got so sick of it . . . but oh! I still LOVE it!



What clinches me blogging about it today was that I found a couple of humorous parodies of it . . . the first for gamers:



And of course The Simpsons couldn't not take part of the action . . .



And finally, xkcd--a web comic Rob and I frequent did this awhile back. It's too funny!


Ohhh . . . the things you do when you've got all the time in the world on your hands . . . :)

Off to the River!

July 26, 2008 commemorates the first anniversary of us owning our car. We wanted to do something to celebrate, wanted to get outside, and wanted to get wet. The initial plan was to go tubing up in Island Park where I'd gone with my ward back in 2004. And then we found out how much it was to buy tubes, and decided we wanted to try out canoing. We could rent a canoe up in Island park for 6 clams an hour . . . but they didn't have any initially available . . . so my smartie-pants of a husband remembered we could rent outdoors stuff from the school--this is what transpired:

We rented a canoe, paddles, life jackets, and a "roof rack" kit for 15 bucks! We picked it up about 1 pm on Saturday and I just returned it moments ago. Our car was a champion hauling the canoe, and we would definitely buy a setup like this for ourselves when we get one!

Rob and I believe in sunscreen, here we are slathering ourselves up!

I'm lovin the haircut . . . I wore a headband in my hair all day and it kept everything outta my face.

Rob here is taking a little "salt" break. As you can see, the river was really calm . . .

So calm in fact that we got about a mile down the river, and rather than stopping off at the "shuttle spot" and one of us walking the mile and a half back to the car, we just decided to row back upstream. It was a great workout!

As funny as the canoe looked on the car, I think it looked ever funnier on the truck, which I used to take it back this morning, as Rob takes the car to work. It was a great experience, and we'll definitely be renting from the school again. Anyone up for an adventure? We'd love to have an excuse to get out again!

Brand New Haircut!

For those of you who talk with me often, I've been wanting to cut my hair now for a good long while. So I just decided to do it. Rob was at work and he figured he'd come home to find me like this:


Well he didn't, instead I was found like this:

And I TOTALLY love it! This is not the everyday "do" of course, just me playing with it before getting in the shower. I don't have a picture that I really like of it "done" yet, but I'll post a pict of that when I bathe my stinkie body and make myself up all cute. :)