The Hard Way...

Things I am learning the hard way parts 981-986...

#981. People who are trying to sell you a used car, don't always tell you the whole truth. I guess an oil leak, a shorting radio and a nearly stalling vehicle are minor details. who knew?

#982. Money does not grow on trees. Or on bushes or vines. Trust me, I looked.

#983. Not all textbooks are rentable. Work on that Chegg.

#984. Everything looks better at night than it actually is during the day.

#985. Just because you bought a used/new car does not mean that you still won't get rear ended at a red light.

& hardest of all, #986. It is never easy to say goodbye.

Oh, how I'm gonna miss those kids.

(the young women and men of the Colony West ward, aka: best. ward. ever.)

It's moving week.

darn it.

Hot Dog & Crushed Tortilla Chip Pizza...

that's the combo you get when we're out of pepperoni's at our house...

Atleast on Brandon's half. I'll stick with veggies on my side. :)

He seriously ate 3 pieces.

I wonder what would happen if we were out of pepperoni, hot dogs & tortilla chips.....

A Mobile Update...

Yay for "pixel-ated" cell phone pictures!!!


This is me at my part time ninja job. Pretty fierce huh? Ok, actually this me at the instacare. yes, I to gave into the swine flu hysteria and went to the doctor's office not once, but twice, certain I had strep or swine flu or some other kind of animal named disease. Turns out I had none of the above. I've learned my lesson... That is until the armadillo virus errupts. That one just sounds lethal.

Here are the infamous animal shaped pancakes I made for Brandon on his birthday. Much like McDonald's food on advertisments the animal shaped pancakes I made looked no where near as awesome as the picture on the box. But they sure are fun for special occasions!

Plus look at the excitment that they bring (only mostly prompted by yours truly)!

Album cover anyone?

This is the alligator also known as Trevor. He's pretty dang cute. & he knows it.

See, I wasn't kidding about the alligator part. He's ferocious. :)

This is how Trevor pretends he's a ghost. As you can see he does a pretty convincing job of it. It's pretty spooky.

& this photo confirms what some of you already knew... My father-in-law. AKA Gary Free. AKA Brandon's father. Is superman. (Hence the superman get up, lousy picture I know but of course he's a bit camera shy!) I'm sure he'll be calling me from a phone booth in about a minute asking me how i could just blow his cover like that. But seriously if you were related to superman I'm sure you'd blog about it too. Don't try to deny it.

& This is our lovely painted (by my wonderful dad) living room! It's so the opposite of green and I completely love it. It's so great we got it painted just in time to move back to Sandy! :(

sigh.

I said the "M" word in type.
I think I'll go cry now...

"Well that kicked our a**!"

and by that I am refering to the river.

oh the river.


I'd say that our river tubing trip can be best filed under "worst. yet most hilarious. idea. ever."


I'll start at the beginning.

Brandon & I were lucky enough (understatement of the century) to get work off so we could go join my family up in Jackson Hole for the weekend. I love Jackson Hole, it can be filed under "most. awesome. place. ever. period." We've been going every year since I can remember and this year we added Brandon and the Beeah's to the mix. so of course it was epic. Next trip I will be there for the whole week. vacation days or no vacation days you can count on it. you miss a lot of hilarity in my family if you're late by even a minute.

It was a weekend full of suprises, card playing, shopping, huckleberry ice cream, extreme night photo shoots, death defying (unless 8 years old or younger) intertubing trips, hostpital visits (don't ask), celebrity moose, same room facebook wall posts, picnic table formal dining and so much more. basically it was a weekend so radical it can only be truly described by photographs...

This was right before we got in the river, before all the of red flags started popping up. For instance, it took us 20 minutes of getting adjusted in our tubes before we could finally get going. Once we had floated oh, 20 feet down stream we realize there was a bridge we could not get under. So we had to climb out of the river, walk around the bridge and start all over. The best part was at the very beginning as we were all trying to get settled an intertube- clad- group- averaging- the- ripe- age- of- 8- years- old passed us, pausing every now and then to watch and giggle over our struggle. We wondered why they weren't getting in the water. We realized why as soon as we got to that wall of a bridge. Thanks for the warning kiddos. We floated calmly down stream for a while, laughing and taking pictures with our water proof cameras. All was well, we even got off to a better start than the 8 year olds and had taken the lead! Then the river decided to challenge us a bit. It started throwing rapids our way, suddenly we weren't just floating we were hanging on for dear life. There were huge rocks to avoid, bridges with beyond low clearance, water falls to tumble down. At one point my cousin Sariah yelled "were going to die!". it was terrifying. Tubes were going everywhere. Clearly the river owned us. & boy did it want us to know it. The most dramatic moment that I can't even think about without laughing was when we were all hanging on to reeds on the side of the river, anything we could hold on to, trying to figure out how to get Karissa's tube (which had floated further down stream) to her without any casualties, and all of a sudden those 8 year olds came floating down stream not even struggling at all, screaming and laughing, there were even 2 to an intertube on some! I can just imagine how hilarious we river rats must have looked! All in all, we made it about half way before my cousin Karissa lost her tube for good and we all decided we were done. We climbed out of the river, wet, bruised, bleeding, minus 2 pairs of sunglasses, down one intertube, paralyzed from the face down in Lena's case and Preston pretty much summed the river trip up for us... "Well that kicked our a**! We all couldn't help but laugh.

Well played river... well played.

But you better believe we will beat you next year!

right guys?!

.....

guys?

:)

Our night photos rock!

Such an AMAZING trip! Can't wait for the next one! San Fran here we come!